


What You See in His Face, What He Sees in Yours

by immortalbears, StellarRequiem



Category: Red vs. Blue
Genre: Alternate Universe - College/University, BPD Felix, BPD autistic Locus, Borderline Personality Disorder, College AU, M/M, Neurodiversity, POV Multiple, Rating subject to change as fic progresses, and while studying for it, autistic locus, falling in love in intro philosophy, lolix, might be an AU but Locus' lowkey fond eye rolling is forever, stormy but positive relationship, studying being a loose description for what Felix is doing
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-12-20
Updated: 2016-10-13
Packaged: 2018-05-07 19:09:44
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 14
Words: 26,834
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5467775
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/immortalbears/pseuds/immortalbears, https://archiveofourown.org/users/StellarRequiem/pseuds/StellarRequiem
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p><i>He feels a light glow in his chest. This suits him well. A name that is not human. It is not a pointless name meant to satisfy the purpose of having a noun that somebody else can call, but a goal that he aspires to. He </i>is<i> the goal now.</i></p><div class="center">
  <p>***</p>
</div><i>It’s something. And </i>something<i> is more than enough, when it’s coming from a man with a face like that, to set Felix’s mind on fire.</i><div class="center">
  <p>______________________________________________</p>
</div>College AU with a twist: Borderline Personality Disorder can play hell with a relationship when one party has it, let alone when they both do. (And one of them is autistic, too.) Nevertheless, Locus and Felix will carve a relationship out of the very similarities that expectations say should be tearing them apart . . . even if they have to battle school, themselves, and occasionally each other to do it.
            </blockquote>





	1. Locus of Control

 

**_Locus_ ** _(Noun) /ˈləʊkəs/_

_MATHEMATICS_ _a curve or other figure formed by all the points satisfying a particular equation of the relation between coordinates, or by a point, line, or surface moving according to mathematically defined conditions._

 

There are many things that others know him by, but he no longer thinks of responding to them. For as long as he had known, these names were names that people only ever used to show him that they held power over him.

The brown-haired man had let his hair grow long. It falls down to his shoulder now, covering his eyes when he looks down. He does not bother to brush it from his face. Would prefer things to remain dark. He would rather not see a single thing. He brushes it from his eyes only when he has to look at something. His peripheral vision darts to the side, and he jumps like a deer in the headlights as somebody brushes past him. He is too large. He wishes he was smaller. Easier to avoid. So that nobody could ever touch him or run into him ever again.

Many had probably called him names in high school, and some probably still talk behind his back. Fortunately for him, he no longer recognises any of them. Two years of medical leave, and everybody he once knew has already graduated from the college.

And now he is tired. He no longer feels the anger that used to chain him to the reality that he wants to escape from so dearly anymore. He is just a walking corpse. No, functioning too well to be a corpse. He is a robot. A suit of corporal armour made of flesh, too tenacious to die.

He thumbs through the book. Actual military books make him flinch now. It rouses the anger inside of him to know that humans are such complete, and utter trash to one another. He suppresses the anger and the urge to destroy them all at times, remembering just how terrible it made him feel during his freshman year. It’s difficult, surrounded by the voices of other students, talking about him as if he doesn't exist and could not hear them. He would rather not see any longer, or hear any longer. He subconsciously thumbs over the ipod and makes sure that the music is on the highest volume. Would rather go deaf than hear anybody at all.

_No. Not this book. Entirely wrong section, in fact._ He stands in front of the military history section, titles that he had read before facing him. He does not really remember what those books say, though he is certain that if he bothered to, he could probably try and dredge up whatever he absorbed from them years ago. He takes one that he has not seen before, a complete illustration of tanks, and thumbs through it. Beautiful things, wonders of technology. The technical know-how is now beyond his ken. He is too late. He wishes he was better at mathematics. Maybe he would not have to go to classes with the sort of smart-mouthed cretins who populate Humanities, then.

He puts the book back, retaining nothing from it even though he had just skimmed through the words. Right then, his mind is like a very fragmented library itself, burnt like the Library of Alexandria to the ground. No decipherable texts texts left. Nothing but ashes and ghosts.

He knows how to navigate this part of the library, but only as a matter of muscle memory.

No more history books. There is nothing left for him there now, he tells himself, walking away from that section. He is only there for research, to get back into the groove of things before classes start. He is there because he has to be, not because he wants to be. What he wants does not matter. He has no idea what he wants, either way. 

He looks at the psychology section, remembering. Yes. It is useful to arm oneself with knowledge. He goes through the section again, looking for new, credible books that look promising. Finds a few. Picks up one a specific book. Flips through it. Looks like he could learn from it, if only he could get his mind to focus...

“You must have an external locus of control,” he recalls his psychologist telling him. Their sessions together had been slightly more useful than the talk therapists of laugh-worthy intelligence trying to talk to him about things that he had already known. He looks at the book. He looks through the content pages for that one thing that he manages to remember. Finds it. Takes it in his hand, so that he can check it out.

He lingers a bit longer, feeling the old hardcover books. Taking them in his hands. Pretending that he is there with a purpose and knows what he wants to do. He keeps his head down, buried in the books, so that he does not have to look up. Then he will sit somewhere, read the book, and then go back home to exercise. If the soldiers of yore could do it, so could he. He could follow the ritual. Get through the day. He has eggs at home, for his exercise routine. When he gets large enough, perhaps nobody will run into him. He hopes it has that effect, at least.

He walks out of the library, making heavy sounds with his boots. Industrial-grade boots that he knows will last, that make him feel secure in knowing if somebody steps on his toes, they would be stepping on metal.

A guy holding a cup of coffee runs into him. He was not looking, and with his earphones in his ears, he can hear nothing but music. He looks dumbfoundedly at this reckless fool, who at first had the most noxious look, then looked scared as soon as he looked up and saw his face.

He has a scary face, he is often told. He does not know why. People say that he looks serious, even when he isn't.

He feels mild revulsion as he continues on his way, ignoring the stain on his shirt and the slight burn. He must dry the book now. Near the other building, there is a bathroom that is usually empty. He walks in as if he were blind, too tired to care about anything, and somebody else accidentally opens the door in his face. He does not hear their apology, and then their annoyed mutterings under their breath. He does not care.

The book is stained with coffee now; he hopes that he won’t incur a fine. He looks at the pages, glad that the damage is not too severe.

The fragrant smell of coffee under a hand dryer isn't all too unpleasant, he notes. He checks the date of publication, because he had forgotten to, and then looks through the book again. A brown stain highlights the chapter that he was going to read.

“Locus of Control.”  
  
He goes back. On the way home, he goes to a cafe and reads the book. He does not fit in at the cafe. His shoes are too heavy, his hair too long (he combs it everyday, but it lack the sort of refined style that cafe-goers tend to have). His clothes are all black, with a bit of green here and there. The Barista seems reluctant to serve him.

“What's your name?”

He doesn't want to respond truthfully. “Locus.”

“L- Lokus?”

The cup that come to him had been spelled Lokus, but at least his latte is professionally made. Good. He hates incompetence from people who should know better. He takes a sip, and then adds some sugar and cinnamon.

The cafe is full, so he sits outside, in the cold, and reads the book. Nothing goes into his head, even though he is trying his best. He is glad about the stockpile of medication at home, because he will run out eventually from not seeing the doctor.

He looks at the coffee cup. His “name” stares back at him. Beckoning.

Maybe it suits him better than anything else. He wants to remember what he is searching for. An external locus of control. Perhaps he could remind himself by picking this up as a name. Nobody can pronounce his real name right, anyway, he thinks to himself. It will save a lot of hassle. It will be efficient.

He takes out a pen from his backpack. A military surplus backpack he ordered from Ebay. Because, he tells himself, he has better things to do than to go shopping. He writes on the cup, cancelling whatever the Barista wrote, “LOCUS.” He writes, in capital letters, annoyed at how smudged it looks. He writes it again on the serviette. “Locus.” Then, in all small letters, “locus.”

_Yes._ He feels a light glow in his chest. This suits him well. A name that is not human. It is not a pointless name meant to satisfy the purpose of having a noun that somebody else can call, but a goal that he aspires to. He _is_ the goal now.

He gets up with purpose. Tomorrow, he will go to his first class, and introduce himself as such. He expects nothing to change from the people around him, but he knows that this is what he wants. It matters to him, therefore, he will do it.

Henceforth, he will go by the name Locus.

 

 


	2. Firestarter

**_Felix_ ** _(noun) /ˈfiːlɪks/_

_Male given name: from a Latin word meaning “happy, lucky”_

 

Felix shouldn’t care as much as he does about the man. There just isn’t that much to him.

Mostly, he’s big. Massively, deliciously huge. But he’s also rigid, boring, infuriating, albeit in an amusing sort of way. Felix has caught him rolling his eyes at most everything he says, though he never has the spine to come back at Felix directly. But the eye rolling, that’s routine. A constant needling in his mind that by now, he really ought to expect. After all, most days in Professor Whatshisass’s class go more of less the same way: he asks a question. The big guy, Locus—‘ _cause that name's not weird at all—_ waits for someone else to respond, and when no one does, answers it like a good little textbook. Felix interjects. Locus _rolls his eyes_ , and despises Felix from across the isle while their classmates squirm.

The class itself is a cursory, introductory “Philosophy of Morality” course with simplistic content inconsistent with the demands of its professor, and the makeup of the class reflects that. His classmates—those that haven’t dropped—are boring. They all have the same easy, clean-cut world view. Some things are right, some things are wrong, no, morality cannot possibly be relative. No, there is no reasonable justifications for the _perfectly common_ , awful things that happen all over the world _every fucking day_. They are boring, and they are naïve, and they are _pathetic_.

Felix would like to say as much to Locus. The man is, while less of a simpering idiot than some of their classmates, nevertheless making an apparently intentional point of ruining Felix’s otherwise easiest class, and he’d deserve the commentary for the way it cuts him. Locus’ obvious loathing eats at Felix for the entire hour they’re trapped together, and long after, three days out of the week. It’s driven him to snap the pens he’s holding, punch them through the notebooks he’s writing in . . . Locus owes him easily twenty dollars’ worth of school supplies already, and they’re only three weeks into the semester.

But Felix has yet to point that out. It’s easier to sit at the opposite end of the room and watch him instead, definitely _not thinking_ about how someone could hate him _so much_ over so little. About how _easy_ it appears to be. About how badly he’d like to break the guy’s teeth; payback for the scratches in his own enamel where chewing his lip ring has finally done the damage his dentist always said it would, and which Felix always expected. It’s the sort of thing that _would_ happen to him, after all; breaking a tooth using nothing but his favorite part of his own face.

Not that he has a bad face: It’s excellent, really. His best feature.

And it's something he desperately wants Locus, for all his hatefulness, to notice.

Felix demands exactly that at every opportunity. Today, that means beaming up at him as he makes his way down the steps of the center aisle, and snickering when he misses one. Locus’ recovery from the stumble is graceless, and he stares at Felix in apparent, knotted brow bewilderment—without meeting his eyes—for two steps more before turning away again. For Felix, it's _something_.

He clings to that moment in his mind as he watches with less than bated breath, along with the remainder of his class, as Locus prepares his presentation. As Professor Whatshisass fumbles through the basic task of running a computer. It’s a paralyzing boring sequence.

The presentation itself, though, is impressive. Of the innumerable students Felix has had to sit through already, _this_ student is the most interesting, and so too—as luck would have it—is his topic. Which is a mercy.  A lecture of this size, fifty people easily, should never have been allowed to open with presentations in the first place, and they’re on their second week of them already. Which is an offense Felix has rebelled against by not starting his own presentation. Which is due on Friday.

In two days.

 _But I could live with making one like this,_ he thinks, watching Locus speak. Simple. Straightforward. Accompanied by an understand visual aid and a steady, if at moments monotone, voice. _Not a total waste of time._

Assuming he could do it right. Do it justice. Do it well. A thought that sours his stomach: history and logic dictate that he can’t. That he won’t. There isn’t much a precedent for his success in anything he hasn’t sought out for himself. Now, had he decided on his own accord that he _wanted_ to do a presentation, that might have been different . . . 

Felix presses a palm against his stomach. It does nothing to squelch the sudden, rising sensation of bitter tightening that’s inching from its empty confines all the way up his throat.

This happens to him sometimes.

If panic has one advantage, though, it’s resourcefulness. It’s observation. Felix has gotten good at _people_ over the years _,_ at reading them, at making out their motivations and piecing together how to cater to them. What to tell them to make them love him, and make them stay; even after Felix himself i _s_ long gone. (He’s just wise enough, at this point in his life, to know better than to wait for _them_ to leave.) A lifetime on edge has taught him well, and he can see the little quirks, the patterns, which suggest that Locus’ presentation is as good as it is because it is practiced. _Rigidly_ rehearsed. Locus, he concludes, is a perfectionist. And he can’t improvise. He’s a planner, right down to which questions he thinks his classmates will ask. But he doesn’t seem to know how long to wait when no questions are forthcoming: He falters, shifting his weight infinitesimally from one foot to the other with an awkwardness inconsistent with his intimidating size and the vaguely threatening details of his style of dress. Dark colors, steel toed boots . . .

He’s _defensive_ , Felix realizes. Maybe even scared.

And there’s something so despicably sad about that.

Felix’s hand is in the air before he knows what question he even wants to ask, if he has one, the compulsion to reach out and seize this moment of his adversary’s unease and lesson that hate turning knots in his stomach. Knots that he _must_ do something to escape, right now, this instant, because he feels, suddenly, like he’ll vomit if he doesn’t. _Look at me,_ he thinks, offering up his frantic brain and whatever bullshit it can generate on such short notice, _I know you hate me, asshole, but just look up._

Locus does. And when he sees Felix, he stiffens.

It is in that moment this Felix’s brain catches up to his eager hand, and it is in this moment he realizes that he’s made a mistake. Felix is an idiot, a _massive fucking idiot_ , caught like a deer in the headlights of this _massive fucking douchebag’s_ green-eyed glare, and this was a _mistake_. He wants for a moment to crawl under his chair and die of his own stupidity. He could. Right here, right now, he really _could_ will himself to death, he’s sure of it. But locus is staring at him, waiting, expecting, and his runaway mouth manages to spew some half-assed bullshit about his research methods that makes the younger students in the room balk. Felix is three semesters behind where he should be, two weeks from 21 but trapped in a class full of adventurous freshmen and average sophomores. Research methods, by this stage in the game, seem a reasonable topic for a question. The freshmen look like they like to disagree. But Locus accepts it.

 _Locus_ accepts it.

He looks only mildly surprised. He lifts his chin before he answers, looking at Felix directly, if not necessarily in the eyes, and the gesture prompts some of the curtain of dark hair he hides behind slide away from his face. (It's been disguising spectacular bone structure.) He hesitates before he answers, but does so with an even tone.

Felix doesn’t hear a word of it.

Nor of any of the questions and answers that come after it.

All he retains from the second Locus opens his mouth to reply is a buzzing sense of relieved elation and the racing sensation of his mind working overtime, reassessing, _reevaluating_ the significance of so gentle a response from the man who hates him most. _Doesn’t_ hate him, maybe. Strangely enough. Locus glances down at Felix as he makes his way back to his seat, peering at him from beneath his hair. He nods, just once, as he passes.

It’s something.

And _something_ is more than enough, when it’s coming from a man with a face like that, to set Felix’s mind on fire.


	3. Solitary Man

_That is the most assinine thing I have ever heard._ Locus frowns, realizing only belatedly that he has just accidentally rolled his eyes at whoever has just spoken. He looks down onto his notepad and makes notes on the comment anyway. They would probably come in handy. He doodles on the side margin. Frowns harder at specific junctures when the professor tries to pick things up again, but is interjected by the talkative one. _Of course some fool would think that just because humanity has basic urges, they should not try to overcome it. Of course some fool would attempt to justify murder as a 'thought experiment', using the time-old concept that it has always happened. And, naturally, of course they would argue using the circular logic that just because something is, it is the way it must remain, thereby completely defeating the purpose of ethical reasoning._

He does not want to hate this class, but it is hard not to. He sits at his desk, looking through his readings for the other classes while listening to music. Tries to keep his brain from melting from his head whenever people talk.

It is not as if he is actually blind, as much as he may act like it. He wishes he were, because then he would not notice how bright the lights always are, as if they are out to give him a headache. Sometimes, the professor turns off the light to use a PowerPoint presentation. There, relief is to be found. It is the only time Locus lets himself look around, since many students are actually paying attention and looking at the screen.

He tries not to let them know that he is looking, though he is curious. Nobody notices. _Good._ He catches himself watching the talkative one – Felix, they call him. It’s the best opportunity to look at him. He does not like to look at faces, especially not when they talk.

Felix is actually paying attention. He has to grant him that. Like this, he almost looks peaceful. Locus thinks that he could capture a mental image of that, like a photograph, and slot it into his mental library. He knows that it is not his strength, but he tries, anyway.

For such an annoying personality, Felix really does have a nice, small stature, and a beautiful face. He probably is usually very animated as well – he is everything Locus wishes he was, just with absurd arguments . . .

_I must have an external Locus of Control. I must hate him first before he hates me – because he is sure to hate me._

He is fully aware that that is a self-fulfilling prophecy, but it is his instinct to hate, as much as it is his instinct to want to be liked.

The problem lies here, though: he will never be liked. Ever. Nobody will accept him enough to get to know him.

He has the face of a serial murderer (or so he is led to believe), the stature of a brute, and the movement of a shambling corpse. Ungraceful. Ugly. Unlikeable. And, on the whole, he is just not a very _nice_ person. He cannot change that about himself, although he tried. More than once. He will never do that again. The demands that this act made on him were too great. He is no longer willing to pay that price. Now that he can think somewhat clearly, he would rather despise somebody than ever want to be liked by anybody again. It is easier that way.

 _Pre-emptive strikes against a hopeless situation. Always know the aim of every action._ He thinks. _There must always be a concrete aim within reasonable expectations. And never engage in an interaction unless I have to, for every interaction is a potential disaster. I must be logical if I am to remain sane._

He keeps things to their bare bones, focusing on the topic at hand. That is easy enough. He wants a good grade, so that he can eventually make a living doing some research. He wants nothing more than to do research... It gives him an aim, a goal, and he does not hopefully have to interact much, except with books. The idea comforts him.

Locus keeps his face hidden behind his curtain of hair as he walks down the hall. Nobody ever talks to him, or waves at him, or smiles at him. Therefore, it surprises him when Felix _does_ smile at him.

...His legs are too long, and he would have tripped if not for his reflexes. Ungraceful, perhaps, but they get the job done. He furrows his brows and walks away, wondering what, precisely, that was about.

Locus knows his limitations. He knows that so much of humanity is beyond his instinctual grasp, and that he has to make up for that with his mind. But he was always good at analysis. He can analyze this one, too.

Since it is impossible that anybody would smile at him, Locus reasons, Felix must therefore be smiling at somebody else. For Felix either hated him . . . or Felix did not. Most people hated him, so Locus thinks that the likelihood of the latter is so small as to be negligible. Somebody like _Felix_ will most definitely not like him.

As much as he hates the ridiculous arguments that Felix makes in class, he has to admit that he does not actually despise the person, so much as think that he is just lacking in substance. Now, if Felix would simply shut up like the other students, stop derailing the class, and let the Professor talk, he probably would never even have noticed the man for anything other than his face. He would never like a person simply for their face, he thinks. Felix is nice to behold, sure. If only he could ignore whatever comes out of his mouth...

As much as he tries not to think about the possibility that Felix does not hate him, he fails.

Locus knows precisely where he is failing: it is the fact that he is a human. Not a machine. He wants to hate Felix, but if Felix does not hate him, then the alternative is that Felix could like him – but _that_ is a logical absurdity, and it simply confuses him.

Yet, if Felix really does like him, he would be ready to return it. Perhaps not as lovers, though the thought makes his stomach sink. Perhaps simply as friends. He really could use a friend. Some social interaction. Any, really. He has just recovered from his illness, he now has some idea of who he is and what he wants to do. But there is no avenue. No one is there.

Locus frets thinking about it, but the sweet feeling of hope simply will not go away. He hates it when he has no control over his feelings – precisely because he knows that he will eventually be let down.

Fortunately, Locus' presentation for that class is coming up. It gives him something to do. He wants to do it. Tries very hard. Plans it all out in his head, reads the books and marks them meticulously, and then prepares an essay from which he would read. He stands in front of the mirror, hearing himself talk, hating the sound of his own voice as he does so. He will be perfect, and prove himself to Felix. He will let him know that he is worth something, that he has substance. Whether or not Felix hates him after that is up to him.

He knows that he is taking the presentation way too seriously, but he cannot help it. If he does not prove himself to the people around him that he is capable of something, then what is he good for? If there are no results to be seen from his efforts, what exactly is the worth of his existence?

He is surprised, when Felix notices. He does not mind having to answer questions, so long as they are worthy ones, with a point to them. Felix's question has a point to it, and is not said simply for the sake of contradicting him. He actually has to think for this one – he hopes that nobody notices him miss a word or two, though he will chatise himself for these mild grammatical errors later, as he reviews his memories in his brain during exercise.

Locus finds himself feeling something, that when translated to thoughts, becomes: _...Felix is not repulsive, nor completely without substance._

He nods at him when he passes by, mostly because he is the only other person he recognises in the class as having somewhat of a brain. He tries to smile, but his face is already frozen and it is too late to do so. Locus wishes that he is better at having facial expressions, and he is surprised when he sees those cute cheeks flare pink before he glances away.

Realises, belatedly, that Felix appeared perhaps a little stiff and gestured perhaps a little too much because he was... anxious. Locus recognises those details, much like old friends that have always accompanied him.

He wishes that they could talk, because he would have so many things to say about that, to contribute to that. He wants his own value to go towards something, not just... this blank existence that he has to try and maintain in order to stay sane, and alive.

He thinks it is too much to ask for, but he also knows that he will regret it if he does not at least try. Perhaps, the next time he sees Felix, he thinks, he will. If it goes badly, then at least he tried.

Felix's presentation is the week after his. Small class. Locus catches himself watching Felix, thinking that the way he speaks is not bad at all. Thinking that Felix actually did do quite well in the presentation, when he is not simply talking for the sake of it. His presentation is a little short, so they have a lot of time for questions.

Locus wants to show encouragement to Felix, so he raises his hand and begins his question with the proverbial olive branch.

“You make an interesting argument about the Machiavellian approach. I too am a realist when it comes to international diplomacy.  Yet, the United Nations Charter has been signed by many nations today, and this serves as a platform for supranational conventions. Although it is limited and unwieldy, the idea that just because something cannot work does not mean that we should not still strive towards it.”

... _That_ was a criticism. Not a question.

He must have completely embarrassed himself when the floor opened up for questions, he realises. He watches Felix's face for a cue, hoping to find something that does not make him sit down in complete humiliation. He does not wait for the cue to actually come, because he sits down anyway, before it can get too awkward.


	4. Challenges Unaccepted

One extension and one timing-inept professor later, Tuesday morning finds Felix yanking a presentation together from a pile of six notecards, a single slide of Machiavelli’s face, and an argument constructed of nothing but force of will and the academic equivalent of duct tape.  It’s bullshit, he knows, from the opening line to the mic-drop close. But it’s _impressive_ bullshit.

He feels pretty good about it.

And he’ll continue feeling good about it until he’s standing in front of a half-empty lecture hall under the feigned, glassy scrutiny of the thirty-some students who’ve bothered to show up to class. He makes it about halfway into his presentation before their disinterest starts to bite. Before the sampling of people who are actually listening turn the loathing and dismissal of knitted brows and pearl-clutching skepticism work their way under his skin, the sensation like needle-sized hot pokers stabbing at him in itching waves that travel from the back of his neck down into his hands. He resist the urge to clench them at his sides, knowing better than to show so much weakness to a crowd, and closes them into the folds of his elbows instead, crossing his arms, standing askance. The posture flusters Professor Whatshisass, who drops the clipboard he’s grading on into his lap at the same moment as he raises his eyebrows. Felix ignores him. _Bite me,_ he thinks. _Go ahead and stare._ Let them all stare.Life is a bitch and reality stings. It’s time they all figured that out.

Felix completes his presentation on the back of a wave of willed and defiant confidence, pointedly ignoring the sensation of needles in his subdermis and the invisible hand closing over his throat.

He isn’t surprised by the lack of response from his classmates when it ends. He’d already braced himself for the only two possible outcomes:

1) aghast naiveté and a weak attempt to argue, or

2) blank silence.

He expected nothing in between, and was prepared for more of the latter. He was not—and he kicks himself for that, adding to the mess of abstract sensation already crawling around his brain—prepared for the _former_ coming at him in a rush from the most delectable, cracked-lip mouth in class.

Locus has a pretentious way of speaking, calculated and organized and monotone, and Felix enjoys watching it break down as he barrels through his response. If it was supposed to be a question, he loses track of it, instead informing Felix that he’s _wrong_ in a colliding rush of words that lose their force by the end of his sentence, too hurried to be demeaning. He appreciates that: It makes for an open-ended little challenge, for some intellectual sparring in front of Professor Whatsisass and everyone. And if Locus _doesn’t_ hate him, after all, what better place to garner his attention from than a stage? Felix bites back a ravenous smile as Locus snaps back into his chair, falling into it as if he’s been pulled down by the same nasty, imaginary hands that were suffocating Felix the moment before.

“The idea that just because something cannot work does not mean that we should not still strive towards it,” he’d said before he’d fallen. Felix drops his hands to his hips, opening one before he does in Locus’ direction.

“Doesn’t it, though?” he replies, “If it can’t work, then trying anyway is a waste of energy.”

Locus has nothing to say to that, and it cuts Felix deeply. He bites his lip, snagging the piercing there, before releasing it again.   _Oh, come on . . ._

He smiles his best smile, his most winning, sideways, wicked smile, just like the one that made Locus stumble on the stairs the week before, only _better,_ and adds: “Isn’t it?”

Locus shifts in his seat. One of his hands closes on the armrest just a notch too tightly and Felix, with him cornered to his satisfaction, waits. Locus clears his throat before he speaks. Straightens the _enormous_ breadth of his shoulders. Felix has to grit his teeth to hold his smile in place, resisting the urge to bite his lip again (or lick it) as they shift beneath his shirt.

“No,” Locus ventures. For a moment Felix is petrified that this is all he has to say, the two second delay before he continues an impatient eternity. “If one could prove that the desired outcome were impossible under _all_ conceivable circumstances, only then would it be a waste. Given that such a thing is impossible, trying, therefore, can only increase the odds that it will work, while refusing to can only prevent progress.”

“By that logic,” Felix declares, far too quickly, “then _anything_ is worth a try.” Nothing is futile. Nothing is impossible. Things like Locus not hating him _become_ possible.

It’s a romantic notion, and Felix should know better than to entertain it. Romanticism never got anyone anything except for hurt. And embarrassed.  And disappointed. And disappointment is a _palpable_ fear for Felix, it drives straight into his stomach, turning it in knots, sends bile up a suddenly closing throat and calls back the invisible, choking panic-hands. He clears his throat. It doesn’t make breathing any easier.

Locus tilts his head a little, as if considering his own response. His eyes, directed everywhere _but_ Felix, are bright beneath the shadow of his hair.

“I suppose that is the case,” he acknowledges, and Felix beams. _Gotcha._ He’s inclined to press the topic further, but it’s such a good opening, and this is for a grade . . . Felix retorts in less time than it takes to blink. For a heart to beat.

“Unjust war included,” he declares. Whatshisass makes a note on his clipboard.

. . . _Nailed it._

Felix makes a point of calling on one more brave soul—some freckled freshman girl who speaks like she’s had a cold since the day she was born—before Locus can derail him again with something dangerous, like an argument constructed of more than wiki searches, or _actual_ philosophy. If Locus is the kind of person he thinks he is, then he’ll have read far enough ahead to be able to do that. (He _undoubtedly_ has.) But he also makes a point of ignoring her while she talks, trading in observations of how often she has to push her glasses up her nose for a continued study of Locus’ face. He’s watching Felix out of the corner of his eye, scowling a little, maybe, but it’s not mocking. It’s not dismissive. Not _hateful._ He looks more . . . _resentful_. Holds his mouth in a tight line as if there are still words trapped behind it. For one irrational moment Felix considers cutting off the stuttering freshman to give him another try, test his nerve, but, really, he’s not stupid enough for that. However much Locus’ romanticism might be squirming in his chest, and against his brainstem.  _Anything is possible._

Felix, for the second time in as many weeks, ventures to grin at Locus as he moves up the aisle at the end of his stint on stage. And Locus, for the second time in as many weeks, nods.

_Anything is worth a try._

His own words stick in his head like a burr, sharp, and itchy, and unrelenting, for the rest of the day. Through the two other classes he attends, and the one he skips. Through dinner, through his shower, the words chase him all the way into his bed. The breeze coming through his open window does nothing to cool their impact.

Felix rolls over, further knotting his legs in his own sheets, unintentionally unwinding the cocoon of duvet that he’s built himself, to stare the thought into the ceiling. He swears up at the 2:00 am dark. It doesn’t answer.

 _Let it go, dumbass,_ he tells himself. His unruly brain ignores him: _anything is possible._

“Not _anything,_ ” he snaps out loud, taking out his preoccupation on his indifferent ceiling while ignoring the condescending display of the time on his phone. It lays beside him on the mattress, cruelly indifferent and full to the brim with unsaved numbers.

 _Of the things that_ are _possible_ , it seems to ask him, _isn’t his number one of them?_

It’s a stupid, stupid fucking question.  _He’d have to want to talk to you for that._ Not-hating and _wanting,_ Felix knows, are two very different things—all too much like the difference between wanting and _wanting to stay._

 _Anything is worth a try,_ the phone replies.

Felix groans, and turns his face into his pillow. It takes him another hour to fall asleep, and he skips all of Wednesday’s classes.

 

 


	5. Monster

Locus does not understand how, for most people, their body is not a prison of the soul. When Felix speaks, Locus takes far too long to reply. What should only require a split second's worth of response time becomes stuck at the tip of his tongue, and his mind goes blank.

Locus _has,_ against better judgment, let himself be talked into admitting that even unjust war is “worth” trying.

The conversation ends there.

Locus lowers his gaze, Felix's assured grin searing into his mind.

There is a burning inside of him that tells him Felix is all wrong, but that he is not understanding how, nor does he understand what that feeling is trying to suggest.

He wishes he could just read some academic journals to _explain_ why this is wrong, but there is no time for that. He is not a fast nor efficient reader during the semester, when there are way too many people around him no matter where he is, when he has many things to prepare for and to juggle all at once. So, Locus replays that small exchange with Felix in class in certain idle segments of the day: on the way back home, in between classes, when he brushes his teeth, when he cooks, and even when he exercises.

_“Trying, therefore, can only increase the odds that it will work, while refusing to can only prevent progress.”_

_“Then,_ anything _is worth a try. Isn't that right?”_

Locus is tired. The more tired he is, everything feels louder, brighter, faster. He spends the rest of the week lying in the dark, staring at the ceiling.

He pretends that he is a soldier with a purpose, as he forces himself to go to classes. When he comes back, he finds himself staring at the razor that he uses to shave a little too long, thinking about how much relief it could bring if he would just. . . He refuses nonetheless, even though he does not see a point in resisting. He runs his fingers along old scars instead.

It does not matter how strong his body is. _He_ is weak.

_“Anything is worth a try, right?”_

_…Not anything._ Locus finds himself thinking. _The worth is in trying, but not everything is worth. . ._

He _wants_ to argue, to rationalize, and he knows why he is faltering.

Something is growing inside him, gnawing at him from the inside. It feels dark and inescapable. For all of his belief about compassion and humanity, he does not feel like a person. He is merely an imposter. Living as he does, he is a shadow. A monster that lurks in the dark. People do not make a difference to him, and he does not make a difference to anybody.

How can somebody like himself take the moral high ground?

The emptiness inside of him turns into a certain ache. The ache somehow felt a little better when he thinks of Felix's smile, of their interactions.

At the end of the week, he settles down at his usual cafe, with a hot cup of something, a turtleneck sweater, and a notebook in which to pen his thoughts, so that he can better organise them. When he wants to write, nothing comes out.

He remembers being confused by Felix's smile, wondering what could make him smile the way that he does as he says the things he does. Locus generally has no curiousity about other people, because they are predictable and boring.

Felix, on the other hand, has given him an existential crisis, and so he wonders.

Locus has his own preconceived notions about what is right and wrong. He realises that not everybody subscribes to that belief, but he is also convinced of the efficacy of his world view. It resides within him like a mental fortress, as the very foundation from which he acts and the very thing on which he bases his sense of self. If his limbs were stretched wide around him like a protractor, with his torso as the starting point, his center of gravity would lie precisely on the notion that trying to be better is what makes him. . . Not _human_ , exactly. He knows that humans are terrible to one another. But something like human. It is what defines him, like in a dictionary entry. Even though that is ultimately unfeasible for him to act accordingly.

But that is merely the limits of his body. Locus knows that when he lifts the corner of his lips to smile, it often looks like a grimace instead. He knows that his large body intimidates people and that people cower if he raises his voice. None of these are things that he can help.

He also knows that this fear makes people much more dangerous to him than he will ever be to them.

Above all, he is a monster. The monster that has been reviled for so long for simply being what he is, despite having no intent or inclination to harm others. A monster that wears black and steel toed boots and covers his face with his hair because all he wants to do is _hide_.

Felix is the only person who is not afraid of him.

Locus knows this, because of the slick way that Felix responds to what he says and the smiles that appear on his face. Locus doesn't know why, but every time he sees that smile, he feels like he is staring into the sun. Felix's smile is so bright that he can't bring himself to look at it, even though Locus feels as if he ceases being a shadow when he beholds it. Perhaps it is because people usually do not smile at him . . .

He is painfully aware that he is grasping at straws.

It occurs to him that he does so because there is a possibility that Felix is right. Everything he knows about people confirms that what Locus thinks is absurdly different from what _they_ think. Even if everybody else pretends otherwise, the state of chaos in the world could only point towards the fact that Felix's point reflects everyone else’s. The difference is that _Felix_ is forthright about it.

Locus cracks his knuckles, relaxing a little from the sound of loosened joints and satisfying snaps.

The people sitting near him at the cafe turn to look, and one pointedly gets up and moves to another table. Locus understands what that is about, but is so exhausted, that he is simply relieved that there is one less human being beside him.

_Who. Am. I?_

He accidentally knocks over his mostly empty drink, but quickly picks it back up such that nothing spills.

_I am Locus._

_My aim is to expand my locus of control. Everything else is irrelevant._

Locus looks down at the blank piece of paper. Suddenly, everything becomes clearer. He shall talk to Felix in private. He will devote his weekend towards making plans on how to approach Felix.

From his inner turmoil, he only manages a glimpse of something. If fate exists, then its form is that of this quiet voice within him, speaking through the emptiness, telling him that he should act.

Felix is refreshing – a quick wit, a sharp mind, a keen understanding of humanity in ways that Locus himself doesn't seem to quite get. Felix dares to say what he does, and for some reason Locus finds that incredibly admirable.

If it fails, then it fails. Locus has been met with revulsion and hatred all of his life simply for existing. Why will this be any different from the rest? He will try, and it will fail, but Locus will feel better for having tried.

 

*

 

Locus understands, on a fundamental level, that he conveys what he wants to say better in writing, so he’s written Felix a note with his number on it. He wants to get to know Felix better – no pressure, of course – and he finds Felix intelligent and incredibly well-spoken.

Locus knows precisely when he will see Felix. A few minutes late into the lecture, Felix will come sauntering in, usually with a cup of coffee. He is incredibly hard to miss, not just because of Felix's unique looks, but also, because of his attitude. Like a fool, Locus is always there twenty minutes early, standing in the balcony if he has to wait, and, as soon as the room is available, moving in to take the last seat on the second row of the lecture hall.

He knows that Felix prefers, like most other students, to sit at the back where there is less scrutiny from the Professor, which is why he tends to choose the front instead. Less people means less distraction, and he usually gets his island of solitude that way.

He is not willing to sacrifice that, since he has no idea where Felix will be sitting.

His only chances are during the breaks that pepper the long two-hour lectures, when most people get up and either use the bathroom or go for a smoke. Locus never moves during breaks, but today, he fully intends to catch Felix and hand him the note.

Should that be impossible, he will then then have to move quickly at the end of the lecture, because Felix will be quick to leave. (He observed that the last lecture, when they exchanged smiles and a nod . . . At least, he’d _tried_ to smile. How it came across was probably something else altogether.)

With that, Locus' ears perked up as soon as the professor announced that it was time for break. He quickly follows Felix out of the lecture hall, surprised at how fast the shorter man is when it comes to leaving. He loses sight of Felix at the doorway – so Locus stands around outside, feeling a little lost, but staying because he does not want to miss this chance.

The other students are all back inside the lecture hall when eventually Felix returns from another direction, strolling slowly while sipping from a cup of coffee, looking as tired as Locus himself is. (Locus did not have a good night's sleep, since he spent all of last night mentally rehearsing everything.)

He isn't sure if he should call him by his name, but he tries anyway. “Felix.”

“Oh, hi, Locus.” Locus cannot believe it, but Felix remembers his name. It makes him feel all awkward. He looks away, in Felix's general direction but past him, taking in the gestalt of the shorter man, noting that when Felix had opened his mouth, it smelled like tobacco and milk coffee.

Before Felix can say anything, Locus holds out a piece of paper. “I. . . have something for you.” 

“For me?” Felix raises an eyebrow and smiles. He takes it and does a gesture with his hands. “Thanks. What's it about?”

Locus feels himself freezing. “Just. . . read it when you have time. It's not urgent.”

“I'll read it later.” With that, Felix stuffs it into his pocket and strolls back to his seat.

Locus, on the other hand, stands for a few moments outside of the lecture hall. He heads back in after a while, hoping that it is not too obvious to the others what he has just stayed outside for.

 

 

 

 


	6. Ready, Fire, Aim

Felix waits until Whatshisass starts up again, until he is sure Locus' attention is up front, to drop the piece of paper he’s been clutching inside his pocket onto the desk. It lays there, crumpled and folded and waiting, with Felix is almost afraid to open it. After all, it’s a _note_. Who even does that? It’s so . . . _high school_. Felix had sent piles of these things around in those days: scraps of paper with his number scrawled them, gossip back in forth with the squad of friends that has since fallen apart so spectacularly that the lot of them may as well be dead—

Anonymous and sometimes deserved hatemail pushed through the slats of his locker.

A couple of breakups even happened that way, when he was young and stupid and still willing to trust in dating that didn’t include Grindr; that did include such unnecessary, misleading details as kisses at the door and nice dinners and parental (dis)approval. But here he is, a grown-ass adult, in college, staring down at a crumpled piece of notebook paper handed to him by another grown-ass, collegiate adult who Felix suspects might be even older than he is.

And he’s terrified.

There’s a cramped, fluttering feeling in his abdomen as if his stomach has grown wings.

Felix slides one finger across the desk, dragging it over the plastic until it collides with the note with a near silent crinkle of paper. He inches a bitten-blunt nail under a folded corner. His hand is shaking. _Stupid_. It’s just a note. He might even know what it is. _So stupid._

_. . . Must be the coffee._

Felix nudges open the paper just enough to make out a number—a four—perched in a wild, almost artful scrawl on the paper’s pre-printed lines, and he snaps his hand back.

Locus' phone number ends in a four.

Locus phone number ends in a four and Felix knows it because it is sitting right there on his desk, printed in black pen on a sheet of lined paper that locus handed _to him_. Directly. On purpose. With his _own hand_ ; a massive hand with neat nails and long fingers and dark skin that made Felix’s own look small and _almost_ pale by comparison.

Felix stares at the note without breathing until his lungs start to ache before wrenching his phone out of his pocket. He slides it onto the desk with a sideways glance toward the room at large. Professor Whatshisass could care less about phones—he doesn’t have the nerve, Felix suspects, to try and comment on them—but the TA sitting two rows down does, and she has a wicked watch-it-kid glare and a shout like drill sergeant which she turns on Felix often enough in recitation for him to know that it’s the last thing he wants to deal with in lecture. Vanessa is a force to be reckoned with, and he watches the back of her head for so long his heart rate almost has time to come down again, just to be safe, before turning his attention back to the note.

The breath he releases blows it right off the edge of his desk.

Felix dives for it, Vanessa instantly forgotten, checking his shoulder against the arm rest and his shoulder against the desk all in one fell, aching swoop. The students sitting nearest to him are glaring when he sits up again, but for once in his life, prize in hand, he doesn’t care. At all. He’s too excited to care. Too nervous. So much so that he only hesitates a moment when he unfurls the note again—all the way, now, pinched between his fingers at the fold—to discover that it is, really, truly, a _note._ Multiple lines of text, and even a paragraph break, written in the stiff, exacting style of a business proposition. Like a fucking _LinkedIn message_. Which, in and of itself, is nearly a turn-off.  But Felix doesn’t _care._ He _can’t_ care, not when the strangeness of it is coming from Locus. _Locus_ is welcome to be as strange as he likes, with a face like that. With a _body_ like that. (Felix had glimpsed the outlines of musculature beneath Locus’ shirt, when he handed the note to him, which were promising enough to make his mind blank.)

Besides, Locus has always been quiet. Such a planner, so hesitant beneath his steely façade—if anyone could be expected to offer a written explanation while handing a person their number, it would probably be him. And, skimming the words, Felix finds the contents reasonable enough: A little flattery, a little unasked-for continuation of their post-presentation conversation from the week before that does, if nothing else, spark in the small corner of Felix’s brain still remotely capable of thinking about school in the moment, an invitation to talk. ( _Just_ talk, to Felix’s miserable disappointment.)

Really, all things considered, this is a victory: Felix one, universal-law-that-everyone-hates-Felix, zero.

He celebrates by punching the number into the send line of a text.

_< Felix’s number>_

He types it, he deletes it. _No, bland._

< _Felix >_

_No, boring._

_< Felix’s number ;) >_

He stares at that draft, tempted for a moment before a suffocating wave of revulsion washes over him. _Are you trying to screw this up, dumbass?_ It’s too much, too soon, too presumptuous for Locus’ limited invitation. He chews a sore spot into the flesh around his lip ring while he deletes it, struggling to think of something better to put in its place. _< Hey, how’s it going? (It’s Felix)> _is, eventually, what he types. It’s not perfect, but it’s passable, and it is, more than anything, an _actual_ conversation starter. There is nothing more annoying than a “hey” and nothing else.  Not that small talk is much better, but at least it isn’t “hey.”

Felix leaves the text open on his desk until the end of class. Texting him _in_ class would seem desperate. Overeager. Pathetic.

Clingy.

_. . . I hate that word._

Locus jettisons himself from his chair faster than Felix does when Whatshisass finally releases them, beating him out the door, and Felix carries his phone in hand rather than in his pocket as he follows him out. He watches him go, walking with his head down across the quad. Felix can’t decide whether he looks more shy, or scary, let alone which one he finds more appealing.

Felix heads in the opposite direction. His bus stop is there, right where Main Street curves to avoid cutting through campus, and he spends his wait pacing back and forth in front of the bus shelter, turning his phone over and over in his hands. Five minutes after lecture. Ten. _Fifteen_. The bus is late. It’s been long enough, he could send it now. The other students leaning against the shelter are staring at him.

“What?” he pauses his pacing long enough to snap at the nearest one, a tall, athletic brunette in a shapeless hoody and tight pink volleyball shorts. She recoils. A “Fuck you, man,” comes back at Felix from someone behind her while she scowls. Felix scoffs, stuffs his phone in his pocket, and pulls out a cigarette instead.

The bus, of course, arrives a minute later.

He lets the rest of them climb on before him, dragging on his cigarette. It’s a cheap one, bummed off some guy who’d been standing at the bus stop by his house this morning, but it does its job. Felix lets the bus leave without him, surrounding himself in a comfortable blanket of smoke that clings in the autumn-cool air, drinking in the buzz of nicotine. He stands there for half a cigarette before pulling his phone back out. His draft text message is there, waiting, just behind the lock screen.

The phone seems to stare up at him from his palm. _Well? Are you going to send it or not?_

Of course he is.

Everything is worth a try.

_Unless you fuck it up._

_. . . Unless he doesn’t answer._

His thumb is over the send button when it happens: a sinking, as if all of his entrails are shriveling up and dying inside his torso to make room for a flood of redundant, echoing thoughts. _What if he doesn’t respond? What if it doesn’t go through? How long should you wait for a response?_

_What if he changes his mind?_

He had, after all, left class so _quickly._

His throat seals itself shut somewhere just above his stomach, the tightness rising up from some nasty corner of his being, crawling up his throat with raking claws. _Just send it,_ he tries to tell himself anyway. _Just fucking do it._ He tastes bile.

He has to stomp his cigarette out, and move closer to the trash can. He is certain, for a moment, that he is going to vomit. The empty feeling turns sour.

 _Just fucking do it._ Felix clicks the number on the send line.

 _Just do it, dumbass._ Deletes the text.

_What if he changes his mind?_

Felix shoves the phone back into his pocket as the next bus pulls up. The text is gone.

But he did save the number, first. He never saves numbers—he doesn’t need to, when it’s other people that text him—but he wants to keep this one, as if keeping it while doing nothing were enough to maintain his winning streak. Though he knows, in his hollow chest, that it isn’t.

 _Maybe later,_ he assures himself, though later never comes.

 

*

 

The next time he sees him, Locus is wearing a hunter green turtleneck that clings to his shoulders and his chest. It stops Felix in his tracks, and Locus glances up the aisle just in time to see him staring. It’s a guarded, startled look, not at all angry, bright in his green-tinged eyes. They’re hazel, technically. Felix had noticed when Locus brought him the note. Hazel with more green than anyone could possibly deserve.

They’re green and they’re gorgeous and they catch Felix’s and then _drop._

_I’m an idiot._

His mistake, of course, had been letting himself think. He should know better than that by this stage in his life: don’t think. _Do_. _Take what you want or shut the hell up._ Thinking leads to invisible hands and a fluttering stomach, to the six despondent hours he’d spent on his futon Tuesday night, staring at his computer screen without absorbing any of what was on it, wishing he could curl into himself until he shrank down to nothing, wondering what, if _anything_ , he can do right.

So today, Felix doesn’t think.

He dives toward the front of the room, the exact opposite direction than he usually moves in. There aren’t many people here to witness this revolutionary moment—he’s on time, for once, courtesy of a closed coffee shop that had seemed like a curse only five minutes ago. Felix jogs down the stairs and ducks into the row where Locus is sitting, drops his bag—prompting him to jump—and drops into the seat beside him. Directly beside him.

Locus stares at him as if the Earth has just been moved by his presence, and he hasn’t decided, yet, what to do about it.

Felix beams.

“Hey there,” he says.

Locus glances away, just over his shoulder, then at it, evidently studying the hem of his jacket for a second before he blurts: “You didn’t text me.”

Felix fights his smile, holding it at gunpoint rather than letting it retreat. For a second the effort almost hurts his face. Then he shrugs.

“Oh, yeah,” he says. “I, uh, lost the number like an asshole. Thought I might just give you mine instead . . . do you have your phone on you?”

_. . . I am so smooth._

Locus surrenders his phone with a noncommittal noise. Felix hammers his number into it. He can see Locus’ thoughts turning like gears behind his eyes when he passes it back.

He glances down at the screen. At Felix’s name and number. He’s put in his real name, his full name—quick Korean syllables jammed up against a non-sequitur Anglo surname—just to see what Locus will do. He stares at it without evident vexation, and without comment.

“Do you prefer this name?” he asks after a moment. Felix shrugs again.

“Nah. I’m just fucking around. I mean, I’d probably like you even better if you could pronounce it . . . but no pressure.” He cracks a new smile, his best crooked one, and adds, “Felix is fine.”

Locus glances at him, and at the phone. There’s a “nickname” option on the contact screen. He types “Felix” into it, hits save. Plants the phone in his pocket before glancing up again.

“Felix,” he affirms. The name sounds pleasant coming off his tongue, clean and sharp, and Felix revels in it a moment too long before replying.

“Locus. Nice to meet you. Y’know, officially.”

He really shouldn’t have hesitated, wasted seconds on the quiet but giddy happiness that’s settling in his chest, because time runs out on them almost as soon as Felix is finished speaking.  Locus’ response is swallowed up by Whatshisass’ weak attempts to bring his class to order before it can finish leaving his mouth. Felix grins at him, and shrugs, turning his attention to the front of the room.

It’s only as he does that he realizes the flaw in his plan: with Locus—arguably the most studious person in the room besides the professor—sitting six inches away from him, it would behoove him to actually take notes.

 


	7. This Is How He Disappears

The week, for Locus, is neither a good one nor a productive one. Most weeks are not, as they are jam-packed with people. If a class has a group discussion, and they often do, everyone makes a point of ignoring Locus until the teaching assistants shuffle him into an arbitrary group. Locus is usually prepared for his classes, so people tend to listen to his view on the matter, but that is all that he has going for him in that aspect.

Being invisible is slightly better than being reviled, or feared. Though, to Locus, it is simply another form of hatred, of saying that he is not good enough for _them_.

Despite knowing that he should _not_ wait for a response from somebody like Felix, who is probably different, but still one of _them_ , he waits, regardless. Since he keeps all of his notifications off—no point in having any when nobody except marketers contact him, he figures—he checks his phone repeatedly. In one of the classes, the teaching assistant points out that nobody, _hint_ , should be using their phones so openly in class. Locus does not even realise that the teaching assistant is talking about him until much later, when they go up to his desk and tap on it. He apologises, with too much bluster and loss of composure for what he is comfortable with.

The rest of the week becomes hazy, and although he continues his routine and tries to ground himself in reality, he feels as if he is floating away as the small connection that he has attempted to make with another has all but disappeared into thin air.

Locus does everything that he has been taught to combat this. He chews his food slowly, to better feel the texture and the taste, but it is all pointless motion to him, even with the sensation that it gives him. (If he could, he would completely settle for a tasteless bag of nutrients packed in one juice box.) He takes in deep breaths when he feels his heart race, but nothing stops the lingering suspicion that he may just be dying of a heart attack. Something which he might welcome with open arms, if he knew for sure that it would be deadly, and not just another ordeal to endure.

In the gym, the weights in his hands and that of his own when he exercises feel a little better. Locus lifts them, feels his body move, albeit as if through the lenses of a very boring and menial movie. On some level, he realises that it is all too real, but he doesn't stop exercising until his entire body gives up on its own. The next couple of days, he walks with the gait of a zombie; one that aches from muscular overexertion.

 _It is nice to feel_ something _._

At the end of the week, Locus knows, for sure, that the text he is waiting for is not coming. He wonders if he has written too much, and ponders over every detail that he might have missed or overshared. He drafts multiple other letters in his head, wondering what it is that he has done to have pushed Felix away. Perhaps Felix thinks of him as a creep – he certainly would not be the first.

He supposes that Felix's thought process might have gone like this: “That weird guy in class just handed me a paper! It's so _creepy_.”

Still, that is fine. He tells himself so, trying to ignore the empty feeling inside his gut. Nobody owes him anything, least of all their attention.

Locus feels as if he is disappearing, and nobody will miss him.

On Sunday, he looks into the mirror, and thinks, perhaps it is time to change his hairstyle. Even though he keeps it in a ponytail during gym, it has grown long enough to be a nuisance that it could get snagged on machinery. As he pulls up his hair and reaches for a pair of scissors, something stops him.

It is what he sees in the mirror. Whoever is inside the mirror looks like it is moving on its own accord, even though he knows on a logical level that the mirror only reflects the light that bounces off his corporeal frame. When he stops, the person in the mirror stops. When he moves, the person in the mirror moves accordingly.

Usually, Locus has little use for mirrors. He glances at it when he passes by, in small segments of the day, concentrating on one part of his face at the time. Usually, it happens to be whatever it is that he's trying to clean, such as his teeth, or the grime from his eyes. Seeing his face like this, in its entirety, makes him pause.

The person in the mirror looks tired and miserable. There is a wrinkle on his forehead, and a couple of strands of greying hair. He brushes them aside, watching them disappear into the rest of his mane.

Locus lets go of his hair, and brushes it back into place. He recognises himself in the mirror, once more, as nothing more than a general gestalt.

Everything feels right with the world again; he no longer feels vulnerable or strange. If he turns into a ghost – if he disappears – that would be better than being real and ignored. That way, he gets to remain who he is.

People who claim that “locus of control” has to do with belief never truly understand that sometimes, no matter how much one tries, everything is impossible.

Locus' locus of control remains small. And should he ceases to have any impact, then he feels as if he ceases to be.

Perhaps that is not so bad, after all.

 

*

 

Locus strolls into the lecture hall, eyes down as usual. He looks up in surprise when he catches sight of a familiar shape, one that has plagued his thoughts for far longer than it should have. It is more familiar than that of the others. Yet, Locus has lost his sense of attachment to this form; that person-shaped figure named Felix _should_ be nothing more than another to him.

  
Felix still does not seem to hate him, which he finds surprising, but as he turns away, the emptiness inside of him awakens again and threatens to devour him. He tries to shrug it off. Felix is just another person. One of the rest now. That should bear no meaning whatsoever, nor should it change how they typically interact.

Still, it is impossible not to feel something, even if it is the looming vastness of _nothing_.

Locus unpacks his things mechanically, perhaps a bit absent-mindedly. He doesn't feel at all there, not quite, so it surprises him when something happens, and he is jolted back rudely into reality.

_Felix?_

He looks at him, startled. Cornered, perhaps. The anxiety builds up in his throat and belly, making it impossible to speak for a moment.

“Hey there.” Is that a greeting? Locus is unsure of what to make of it.

What transpires next is a blur. Locus passes his phone to Felix. He does not quite remember what leaves his mouth. He only knows that both of them say something, and then he hands his phone over. When he gets his phone back, he feels like this is a surprise test; a little something that he isn't prepared for, and doesn't want to fail.

“I would probably like you if you could pronounce it... Felix is fine.”

Locus makes a mental note to himself to look it up online later. He does not know this language, though it looks Asian.

If this is a test, he wants to ace it. But first things first. He will work with what he can, now.

“Felix.” Locus says, testing the other man's response in return. The clouds parts in his spiritual landscape of loneliness and the rays of hope came bursting through, bright and blinding. He feels something heavy within lift, like fog on a sunny afternoon.

“Locus. Nice to meet you, officially.” Felix replies.

Locus looks up through his hair, hoping to understand what Felix thinks of him right then. He sees nothing but a smile, and what people in textbooks refer to as a relaxed posture, which somehow lifts his spirit and twists his guts at the same time.

He is not aware of it initially, but the usual grimness of his conscious smiles fade away into a genuine, light-hearted one.

Locus looks back down at his bag, takes out his notepad and pencil case accordingly, fetching his standard pen and highlighter. A hand hovers over the scribbles and doodles by the side, done whenever something else isn't happening, and he finds himself breathing in harder now than the class has started.

It is hard to concentrate, but he manages. Locus listens carefully, jotting down whatever he hears mechanically, drawing diagrams to help himself understand whenever it is possible to do so. He tries not to look over at Felix, but he does so, from the corner of his eyes: The other man seems to be engrossed in the lecture, too, which rather impresses him. If somebody as intelligent as Felix is actually studious, then he must simply work even harder, because this is now the bar to which he will hold himself.

Felix informs him, when the time comes, that he is heading out for the break, which does not surprise Locus in the least, given what he's already observed about the other man. He looks around quietly, feeling a little more relaxed in the other man's absence. The professor and TA have both gone out for coffee, too, and Locus looks at the notes that lie on Felix's desk. The handwriting looks messy, and Locus tells himself that it would be inappropriate to read what somebody else has written, even though it is so easy to do so now.

He looks through his phone again, and writes down Felix's name on another sheet of paper. He will be able to look on the phone itself, that way, if he wants to.

The class restarts, as usual, and Felix is not here until a few minutes later, when he comes back in with a cup of coffee and the smell of cigarettes.

“Welcome back,” Locus says, feeling that his voice is probably a little too loud. He turns deliberately so that he does not end up showing Felix his back as he returns. He is a split second too slow; Felix is already in his seat when he turns fully, so he sits there, half-facing the other man for a few uncomfortable seconds before turning back to face the front.

Felix flashes him a grin anyway, and looks at the Professor again.

Locus realises, for the first time, that Felix's eyes do shine quite brightly when he looks to the front, where the slide reflects off his pupils. He wonders if Felix can see him staring from the corner of his eyes.

Although this should not feel real, it does. That is not something that he is quick to dismiss as insignificant.

Locus isn't sure what to do about this, or how it will turn out.

He flips through the notepad and writes more, wishing that it were easier to pass the tests of humanity.

 

 


	8. Run and Go

“So, Locus,” Felix waits for him to turn around, notebook still in his hand, halfway into his bag, before finishing. He tries to make his smile easy, engaging, and relaxes back in his chair, propping a foot up on his open bag, “wanna grab coffee sometime?”

Locus’ fingers dig into the notebook he’s holding.

Felix loses his smile as quickly as it arrived, feeling, suddenly, as if he’s been hit by a train. And not one of the little kiddy-ride carnival kinds. The two-deisel-engine-can-pull-cars-for-miles-takes-a-lifetime-to-come-to-a-stop-because-it’s-fucking-huge kind.

_Too soon._

_Crap._

“And study,” he stammers, throat closing up, that word he hates bouncing around in his head. “I really need to review some of the reading,” or actually do it at all, for that matter, “and you seem... well... read. Or whatever. “

Locus continues to stare.

“I mean,” Felix says, the words now a rush, “I can run laps around Doyle, here, in lecture,” he jerks his head toward Whatshisass, whose name he’s surprised to discover he _does_ actually know, when the situation calls for it, “but that textbook just puts me to sleep.”

“Are you asking me to read it for you?” Locus says, speaking at last with evident consternation, and a furrow of his brow that puts a deep wrinkle in his forehead.

“What? _Nah,_ just, go over it, you know? I think I absorb about half of it when I study on my own. I dunno, I guess I was thinking it’d be helpful to talk about it with someone.”

The wrinkle irons most of the way out of Locus’ head.

“I see,” he says, speaking at a measured pace that slows all the further as he turns his attention back to packing his bag. “In that case, yes. “

“To the studying, the coffee, or both?”

“. . . Both.”

Felix tries to swallow his delight, pinning himself down, trying not to come on too strong, though he feels like the tent from his disastrous family camping trip eight years ago: kicked up by the wind at one corner even as the other is hammered into the unforgiving ground.

“Awesome,” he says. Locus glances at him, sort of purses his lips. After a moment of what seems like bewilderment or surprise—even confusion—more so than disdain, he nods a little. It shifts his hair farther into his face. Felix wants, more than anything he’s wanted all day, to push it away again, and he hates himself for how stupid the thought really is.  Shame turns over once or twice in his gut, creating waves in his bubbling joy.

He sits back in his chair, and leaves Locus alone to sort objects in his bag with an intense gaze and a slow-moving hand. Felix watches him, noting where he puts his pencils, which he places the notebook pointedly at the back of the small pile of books and notebooks and folders he keeps there. There is a padlock hanging off of one zipper, perhaps—Felix delights to imagine—for a gym locker.

 _The guy could probably bench me,_ he allows himself. It’s enticing enough to get him to turn around again, leaning casually against the arm of the chair between them. Locus recoils, inching away from the unexpected elbow in his space. He takes up too much of the chair to fit well around intruding limbs. Felix yanks his hand back and crosses his arms, instead.

“Sorry,” he says, “don’t mind me . . .

“Anyway—when _did_ you want to meet?” he can feel the words coming, a freight train through a closing throat that _knows_ it shouldn’t say them, “I’m free for the rest of the day after this class, and—”

Locus is very dark, much more so than Felix, so the color he turns when he blanches isn’t the sheet-white of Hollywood and crappy romance novels, but Felix notices, anyway. It’s a blanch in the sense of body language as much as the color in his cheeks: he shrinks just a little, a little, _little_ little, and stiffens in his chair. And Felix scrambles. _You fuck, you fucking—_

“—and before class tomorrow!” he adds, rendering it as intentional, as absent-minded and casual, as he can muster. “And all day Saturday. I work Sundays, though. Do any of those work for you?”

It takes Locus a beat to reply. A heartbeat, an age. And Felix wishes for a moment he’d been packing up instead of talking, because if he had been, then he’d be free to either grab his things and bolt, or to crawl under the chair, blockade himself there with his bag, so he could curl up and die in peace.

When Locus speaks, it’s a little slowly, almost calculated.

“I believe I’m free tomorrow morning,” he says.

Felix manages to complete their plans, wave goodbye, _and_ leave class, before a sigh of relief so massive it knocks him backward into his heels finally escapes him.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry about the slower, shorter update this time. My own brand of nuerodiversity has been getting in the way of my life, as these things tend to do. There are exciting things to come, though, I (we) promise!   
> -Stellar


	9. White Shadows

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> This is what people with connection to other people feel like, Locus realises. They search for themselves in others' faces, and they find what they are looking for.

 

Locus spends the night looking up languages. Learning the Korean script, it seems, is no different from learning a different alphabet, like Cyrillic. He assumes that Felix does not actually want him to master the Korean language, only learn to pronounce his name.

It is about halfway through the task of matching the characters on his phone to the table online that he realises that this is probably not what Felix had meant, either. People usually do not offer to like others when certain conditions are met.

In a certain sense, people are like machines that operate on certain terms. The problem is, for Locus, they are not terms that he understands on an intuitive level. If Locus was asked to operate a DOS interface, he could at best do it by referring to a manual. A DOS interface would, compared to humans, be easier to understand, because of its binary nature.

What he _can_ infer from the suggestion, though, is that Felix is perhaps predisposed to like him, and that his being learnt on the matter is simply icing on the cake. He thinks about it critically, stopping to make himself a cup of tea.

If Felix expects anything from him, he hopes that the young man is prepared to be sorely disappointed.

Locus thinks of himself as somebody who has positive qualities. He is serious, dedicated, and extremely literal. These would be wonderful traits to have if he worked at Google as a software engineer. He is, however, not studying to be one. Moreover, these are usually not traits that go over well when it comes to having a social life, which is why it also is usually safer to assume that people hate him.

Felix is not the first person to approach him.

To the savvy, lazy sort who has more than enough social capital to hang out with the “weird kid”, Locus would be the perfect “friend” to borrow notes from, in exchange for some vague gestures of friendliness that intrinsically have no meaning other than the superficial. He does not think of these people as “friends”, although he has found out, through experience, that outright stating so generally hurts peoples' feelings. He doesn't exactly understand why, but that is their problem, not his.

There are also generally nice people, the sort who aspire to be friends with everybody. Felix does not seem like that sort; his philosophy is challenging and honest, but not entirely altruistic. Locus thinks about this one girl he knew from middle school. She always gave everybody in the class something on Valentine's Day. It was, incidentally, the only thing he ever got for Valentine's day. That is _not_ what Felix is like.

Another possibility, of course, is that Felix has an ulterior motive.

Locus remembers being hit on before. Once, he had just gotten his first paycheck from working at a gas station – something he doesn't intend to do ever again, if he can help it – and decided to invest in something that would make people treat him less like dirt.

Clothes seemed like a logical choice. He bought formal wear and a dark green shirt. They weren't branded, but they fit him well. He even bought a nice pair of shades to go with them, thinking that if the self-help stories were right, feeling good about himself would probably eventually make others like him, too. When he first wore it and went to a cafe, somebody hit on him. The rest was history. What Locus learnt from that encounter was that he looked older than he actually was, and that people in general lose interest in others when they have neither money, nor social aptitude, no matter how new their clothes were.

There were probably other occasions when he had been hit on, but Locus does not remember them. What Locus does remember, however, is that one moment of realisation in therapy. It was the idea that sometimes, others' compliments were sincere.

Locus has gotten compliments on his looks before, but he hadn't thought of it as anything positive at that time. What are his looks to him, but something he hates and doesn't recognise in the mirror?

Somebody commenting on his “guns” or calling him “handsome” might not have any ulterior motive, but it certainly doesn't make him feel good.

Of course, there is also the question of sex. For many, it is a motivator in itself. Locus would certainly think of it as an ulterior motive, especially since it is generally something that he can do without. There are always things that he doesn't understand. Why was his chest “sexy”, and why did people want to see his penis? It is no different from telling him that they were partial to his spleen. Seeing pictures of their naked bodies certainly didn't make him feel anything, and it didn't make him want to send them pictures of his genitals. It made him confused, at best.

He tries not to think about it, but does anyway. What if Felix wants to sleep with him? Locus doesn't exactly know what he would do. He may be curious enough to try, but everything about it seems like such a reach and a bad idea in general. He comes to the conclusion that if that were Felix's motive, then he doesn't really mind. He understands, naturally, that love and sex are not the same thing, but the idea bugs him anyway. It unnerves him enough that he forgets to swallow the tea inside his mouth, only remembering when he realises that he has a lot of liquid inside it and probably should.

If that was what Felix wanted, he wouldn't be the first, but that isn't what Locus is looking for.

Would he give it to Felix in exchange for what he is looking for? Would that even work? Would Felix even want him? So few are interested in members of the same sex sexually, but it happens occasionally. For the most part, whoever Felix is interested in is not relevant to Locus, unless Felix makes it point-blank obvious that he's interested in him. ...Which probably would not happen.  
  
As for himself, Locus isn't sure what he wants from Felix, either. To him, Felix is the wild card with the dazzling smile and a brightness in his eyes. 

Locus thinks that there has to be something that Felix wants, even though he can think of nothing that he has which could possibly give Felix much pleasure.

_Maybe he actually likes your company, and just wants to get to know you better._

The idea scares him even more.

_No. That is a bad idea. Stop thinking about it._

Either way, Locus finishes looking up Felix's name. He matches them easily, and then sets them aside, thinking that he doesn't want to send Felix running in the other direction. It is good enough simply to _know_. If Felix ever asks, he would not hide it. A healthy curiousity shouldn't be a problem for anybody, but Locus assumes that Felix has boundaries. Boundaries that he probably shouldn't cross. He sets it aside, deciding not to google it.

Locus looks at his notes, and at the textbook, thinking that he probably should prepare for their study session tomorrow. There is enough time to sneak in a couple of hours' worth of revision before he has to go to bed. The time can, alternatively, be better spent on thinking about things to say to Felix, but he assumes that coffee is relatively straightforward. He has little experience beyond awkward silence on that matter.

Since the idea was to study, he decides to look through his textbook, hoping that his knowledge and their focusing on the topic will fill up the time well enough that if anything social happens, it will be of secondary concern.

Locus goes to bed early that night. Logic tells him that he has to be in bed at a certain time so that he can wake up early tomorrow and still be functioning at a certain capacity. Being himself, he will need all of the capacity that he can build up so that he can hopefully work out what Felix wants, in real time.

_Still._

Felix. And him. Something about this says that it is absolutely impossible. He feels like he is standing at the edge of a precipice, looking down into the infinite nothingness below.

Who is he? He is an aim, a goal. A goal that ultimately has proven to be illogical, futile. He does not deny that his attempt to reach out could have culminated in this. And perhaps he has to keep trying, in order for it to work. Perhaps it would simply be an aborted mission, like the fruit of all of his social interactions.

 _If it fails, what then? Is it not more efficient in the long run to simply not try?_  
  
A certain dread lingers at the pit of the stomach. He lies in bed, searching for the courage within himself. Types a message to Felix. Reads Felix's Korean name to himself. Sends the message. Confirms that he will be going to a certain place, at a certain time, and that he hopes to see Felix there.

Tells himself that it wouldn't be surprising if Felix never shows up. Locus still has to go anyway, or he would be unable to live with himself.

He manages to fall asleep, eventually, though not as early as he had planned. Certainly not early enough for the eight hours' worth of sleep recommended by experts.

*

Passing the time can be a torture, if one does not know what to do with oneself in the meantime. Locus is perfectly aware of that. It is part of the reason he works out on the regular basis. There is rhythm in time. One understands perfectly how in sync the body is to the passing of time when a certain pulse can be felt from within. Of course, he isn't exercising right then, so he clings desperately to the thought of it.

He runs his finger along the smooth ceramic handle of the cup, finding it calming. There is rhythm here, too, in tiny gestures.

The cafe is too empty at this hour. The customers, all of whom seem well-to-do, are there to have their breakfast, and generally seem to lead a decent quality of life.

Seeing these people like that makes Locus a little uneasy. He tries not to think about his future. He is himself. Being upset about who he is will not change matters.

Locus practises what he learnt in therapy, trying not to prematurely get upset about his entire being, trying not to fall into the darkness of despair simply because somebody else is yet to be there, and his task at the moment is to wait. Waiting and doing nothing, for him, is a torture. Without the discipline needed to keep his thoughts away from their set patterns, a task which is often not easy if he doesn't have the energy for it, they can easily get out of hand.

The pattern goes like this: first comes the doubt, then comes the mind wandering. His mind takes a couple of hitch-hikes. The cars, of course, go along the route of self-doubt and worst-case-scenarios, and drop his mind off at 3am in the state of Existential Despair.

Locus occupies himself with the coffee, noting its smell and its warmth. It looks windy outside, he thinks, noting the rustling of the leaves. The people around him are ignoring him, and he tries not to think about them as being against him; only indifferent.

_Yes. I can live with that._

He hears laughter behind him. He tells himself quietly that it is not directed at him, and feels peaceful for once. Peaceful enough that if Felix does not come, he can live with it, too.

Five minutes after the assigned time, a familiar figure enters the cafe. Locus looks at him, wondering if this is the Felix that he had indeed arranged to meet. He searches for recognition within Felix's face, and the relief that washes over him is immeasurable, as he finds what he is looking for.

Felix expresses a certain genuine pleasure at also finding him there. The idea that Felix, too, feels the same upon seeing him, is a huge comfort; Locus finds himself relaxing and smiling.

How long has it been since he had last seen a familiar smiling face? Not that he would consider Felix a familiar face, but at least it is one that he has come to recognise.

 _This is what people with connection to other people feel like,_ Locus realises. _They search for themselves in others' faces, and they find what they are looking for._

 _...They find_ themselves _._

He asks if Felix wants some coffee. _Of course he does._ Almost like a wind-up toy whose spring is compressed, Felix bounces back up and hops in line.

 _Jittery_ , Locus thinks. Felix is jittery, on top of smelling like cigarettes.

Felix is quick and agile in a way that Locus isn't. He moves around other people easily, the smile on his face natural and pleasant. Locus finds himself staring, to which Felix responds with a wave. Locus waves back awkwardly, and then looks away.

The contrast between the cafe, before Felix's arrival and after, is stark. As he looks around the cafe, he realises that there is a certain atmosphere in the cafe that was hitherto not present. Locus remembers a course on Existential philosophy. In _Being and Nothingness_ , Sartre described a cafe as being filled with Pierre's absence prior to meeting him.

Now, the cafe is imbued with meaning. That meaning is brought about by Felix's presence.

He smiles a little to himself, and reaches for the books in his bag.

“So,” Felix says, as he sets the coffee down onto the table. “How are you doing?”  
  
“Good.” Locus responds, automatically. He wonders briefly if Felix really wanted to know, but shoves the thought away. “And you?”  
  
“Great!” Felix grins. He looks down at Locus' book, notices that it is on the table, and starts taking his studying materials out, too.

“Is there anything in particular that you would like to revise?” Locus asks, carefully. He isn't sure what Felix needs him for, so he assumes that it is better to inquire. He looks down at his book, flips it to the front page, and looks for the page number. He is pretty sure that he can find the chapter by now based off muscle memory and the little post-it notes, but it is more efficient to simply look through the index.

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Don't worry, I haven't forgotten about this either. I've been writing that Felix fic, which involves a lot of thinking from Felix's perspective, and sometimes it's hard to switch. Also, school is exhausting.  
> Every title is a reference to some sort of pop song, and they're generally what I listen to when I write the stuff.  
> As always, thanks for the kudos and comments - they're what keeps us going!  
> -bear


	10. Nicotine

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Coffee and intro philosophy could probably be construed as a date, but nobody tell Felix and Locus that: They're actually trying to study. (Well, mostly.)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ok WOWZERS did this ever take me long enough. ALL my apologies--life kind of happened all over the place, and while I won't pretend like I was incapable of writing, period, every time I thought of writing this particular scene it was just like HELLO, SITUATIONAL WRITER'S BLOCK. All caps intentional. But so it goes, and I'm back now, running on the fact that the mercs are back for RVB14 as if that fact were jet-fuel, so, at long last, here's some Felix!
> 
> -Stellar

“So,” _be cool,_ “How are you doing?”

“Good. And you?”

 _And you,_ not _You?_ The way Locus speaks makes the question feel a little less automatic, a little less like a courtesy. Felix _tries_ not to revel in it, though he’s floating in nicotine and he can’t quite reign in his mouth with so much buzz in his head.

“Great!” Felix grins far, far too widely, which goes pretty well with how loud he spoke. _Jesus Christ, tone it down, tone it down . . ._ He clears his throat and lunges for his notes. He did say this was supposed to be about studying, after all.

“Is there anything in particular that you would like to revisit?” Locus asks, preoccupying himself with his textbook. It offers Felix a moment to study him, dark and large and square-jawed. He looks so _strong_ from this close, even his face. Oughtta be benching something other than a textbook-strong. It’s like he loves this school shit, or something.

His eyes track the page instead of Felix, and he tries not to frown.

“The last two chapters?” Felix says, reclining in his chair with his arms behind him, a casual stretch. Locus sweeps his eyes over him— _perfect, have a look—_ and locks a cold, quite possibly irritated gaze on Felix’s face. His grin flips, he can feel the corner of his mouth dragging the rest of him down.

“What?” he asks.

“I had assumed you would have something more specific in mind,” Locus says. “I cannot teach you half the course.”

“Hey,” Felix retorts, sitting upright, letting his forearms come down too hard on the table. Locus flinches ever, ever so slightly; jumpy for someone so delectably massive. Dangerous, even—Locus could be dangerous if he wanted to—it’s almost sad that he doesn’t act it. It would make him more interesting, not that he isn’t already. Bookish tough guy—it’s something Felix can get behind. Or in front of. Or—

 _Stop it. He probably doesn’t even like you._ Everyone likes him if he tries hard enough. But Locus, he can tell, isn’t everyone. And besides, no one ever likes him for long.

“I know the material,” Felix continues, “I may have just . . . tuned out some of the minutia.  Besides, maybe I also just want to know what you think of all this. Morality aside.”

“That comment presumes one can put morality aside.”

“Of course you can,” Felix shrugs. “I do it all the time. There’s how the world works, and there’s how we want it to work. They’re two different things.” 

“So long as we think that way, that’s unlikely to change.”

Felix snorts.

“ _Be the change you want to see in the world?”_ he quotes, “you can’t be serious.” _Well, maybe_ you _could._ Locus is certainly serious enough about everything else. For all of Felix’s grinning through this exchange, Locus hasn’t smiled once. Too bad—Felix wouldn’t mind knowing what kind of smile he has. If it’s nice, or award. Or nicely awkward. _But does he even know how to smile?_ If he doesn’t, Felix supposes, there are worse things: it’s whether _he_ can make _Felix_ smile he should be worried about. As long as someone makes him happy, he’s in control. He can handle things. He’s known that for years.

Not that nerves aren’t closing up his smoke-rough throat anyway.

“Yes, I can,” Locus says. “Our l—our control over the world can only expand beyond us if we first control ourselves. _Being_ the change we want to see is the only way _to_ assure change.”

“But what if we don’t want to control ourselves? What about greed and jealousy and _vice_ ,” Felix lets himself lean in a little closer, just an inch, clutching his coffee cup to disguise his fidgety hands and the wave of dizzying pheromone-response that is his reaction to Locus’ cologne. Or is it shampoo? It’s subtle, whatever it is, could even be his detergent. But it’s nice. The kind of smell that makes a person seem warmer than they are—that clings to hair and skin and usually has a taste to go with it.

Locus goes very still and looks in the direction of the table as he answers.

“Then it’s our responsibility to become the masters of our own nature.”

“Not everyone is responsible,” Felix points out as he reclines again. He’s death gripping his coffee, now, and some sloshes up over the top of the foam to-go cup he’d asked for, spilling onto his hand. “ _Fuck._ ”

_Great, great job. Real smooth._

He’s about to wipe his hand off on his jeans when it occurs to him that looking civilized might be the better option. He glances at a frowning Locus. Locus looks at him. There is a moment of paralyzing awkward, which Locus, somehow, manages to break before Felix does.

“Do you need a napkin?” he asks.

“Do you have one?”

“I’ll get you one.”

Locus is up before Felix can protest, returning with a napkin a few seconds later. Felix stares at it for a moment too long, Locus’ enormous hand level with his face, his heart skipping a beat in his chest for some stupid, nonsense reason he can’t quite pinpoint. Maybe it’s that Locus looks so absurdly tall when he’s standing and Felix isn’t. (Not that he isn’t tall stands.)

“Thanks,” he manages, taking the napkin. Locus nods.

“You’re welcome.”

Locus sits down again. He turns his attention to his book.

“Right, studying,” Felix says, forcing a grin across his face.  Locus nods.

“Perhaps,” Locus suggests slowly, “we could review the key theories from each chapter, and debate their merit to review.”

“Hey, I love a good debate,” Felix says. Locus throws him an _almost_ withering look. Felix just beams at him.

They do study—if what becomes a too-heated debate counts as studying—for about 20 minutes before Felix manages to do something stupid.

 It takes him a minute to even realize that it’s finally happened, that he’s finally fucked it up, because he’s thinking too fast, trying to go toe to toe with Locus. The guy is smart—beyond smart. He’s probably memorized the textbook, sure, but it’s more than that. He has a steady way of speaking and explaining himself, but everything he says is built on a foundation of reinforced concrete while Felix slides around on sand. Hell, Locus is probably the guy who writes the wiki articles Felix _usually_ studies from. Felix’s brain has to move like lightening to hold his own. Not that he _can’t_ , he does, but it takes genuine effort, and of course, _of course,_ he goes too far.

“You’d have to be crazy to actually believe that,” he scoffs. Locus, steel jawed, grunts:

“That would imply that I am insane.”

“Maybe you are.”

There is a moment of delay in processing the result: He tries to breathe, let himself calm back to smug, a snake coiling up again after lashing out, but he doesn’t have time to resettle, because Locus’ face tears the floor out from under him before he can. He’s gone blank as a stone. His hand closed too tightly around his drink.

Felix’s throat seals itself shut. The bile trying to rise into his mouth can’t get through, and it scalds for a second before the reflux recedes. He’s not sure if he can breathe, since he’s holding his breath anyway. _Oh no._

Felix: Back to Zero. Universal-Law-That-Everyone-Hates-Felix: One and Counting.

“Joking,” he chokes. Silence. _Oh, come on._ “It’s supposed to be—” _funny. Lighten up._ “funny . . . guess I fucked that one up, though. My bad.”

What instinct makes him change course Felix doesn’t know, since apologizing isn’t usually a part of his vocabulary. Apologizing, in his experience, doesn’t actual change anything. People are going to hate him, or they’re not. So to apologize, really, is just to admit that he might be wrong. And if there is one thing Felix has let himself believe: it’s that he’s not usually wrong. He fucks up constantly, sure, but that’s at least 50% other people’s fault. Case in point: if Locus could just swallow some sarcasm, this wouldn’t be happening.

“I don’t see how that’s funny,” he says. _Not my fault,_ Felix wants to say. It’d be true, if he did. _It’s sarcasm. Get over it._

He imagines Locus getting “over” it equating to Locus getting over him, too. Imagines him walking out the door, still all stone-faced.

“Yeah, like I said, fucked that one up.”

If anyone is going to walk out, it needs to be Felix. He’ll never be able to walk into Whatsisass’ class ever again if Locus is the one that decides he’s had enough of _him._ And if he did that, he’d have no choice but to actually attend all of drill-sergeant-TA Vanessa’s recitations.  And that is _definitely_ not happening.

Besides, he’s decided to like Locus in the last 20 minutes. _Locus,_ Locus, not just Locus’ body. Or, at least, he’s telling himself it was a decision. The guy is odd, really, but he’s also intelligent and interesting in a way Felix can’t quite put his finger on. Interesting in that way that sometimes makes people a problem for him, where they get too easy to think about and too hard to run from, that makes his brain buzz like a cigarette even when he doesn’t have one. Interesting in that way that makes his heart palpitate as he waits for Locus to respond.

“Perhaps we should move on to the next topic,” Locus finally says, and Felix feels for a moment like he’s going to turn into a puddle of relief and leak right off of his chair, so he just smiles.

“Works for me.”

He can feel himself working too hard for the remainder of the conversation, turning on all the charm he can muster, bewildered by Locus’ complete lack of reaction. The only time he responds—and Felix can’t be sure it’s a good thing—is when he occasionally death-grips his drink when Felix leans in too close, staring up at the taller man, hoping beyond hope that he’ll think Felix’s eyes look as great at this angle as everyone else seems to. So he’s careful about when he leans in, smiles too often when he does, just for good measure, while staying careful never to actually _touch_ Locus, either, also just for good measure.

They discuss for a while, getting stuck again only as they pass over the Just War theory, without anything else too untoward happening. Felix has just decided that he could do this all day when Locus starts glancing at his watch too often. Once. Twice. Three times. _Four._ Felix trips over his tongue, watching Locus watch the time, doing that thing he does—the worst thing he does—where he loses control and talks too fast, hoping maybe, just maybe, putting _more_ into what he says will make someone refocus on him instead of tune him out. Locus looks at him with a furrowed brow until Felix’s bullet train of thought finally goes off the rails, and he falls silent.

“We’ve been here for nearly two hours,” Locus says. _Too long, shit—_

“No kidding? Time flies, I guess.”

“Didn’t you have class today?”

 _Yes._ “Nope. It got cancelled.” _I’m cancelling it, right now._ “Why, do you?”

“At 12:30. I need to leave, soon.”

Felix’s heart sinks.

“Fair enough,” he says, _smile, damn it, smile . . ._ “hey, don’t we have a test next Friday?”

“We do.”

“Want to get together and do this again before that? It never hurts to study.”

Locus seems to consider that, pursing his lips slightly, letting his eyes roam over the textbook that’s open between them. It allows Felix’s gaze to do some roaming of its own. He has the overwhelming urge—once again—to sweep Locus’ hair back from his face so that he can see it and read it better, as if maybe that would be enough to tell him whether what Locus is doing right now is thinking of a way to let him down easy, or something else.

“I suppose that’s true,” he finally says. “When did you have in mind?”

“Wednesday night, maybe? After the in-class review? Or, you know, I can just text you and we can figure it out then, too.”

“That would be better.”

“Cool, I’ll text you then.”

Locus doesn’t take long to get packed up, that decided. In fact, he moves a little too quickly. Felix catches himself biting his lip again, the piercing clacking against his teeth until his tongue meets the sawdusty taste of cracking enamel.

“See you around!” he says, perhaps too enthusiastically, as Locus stands to leave. The larger man nods, once.

“That would be nice.”

He walks out, leaving Felix reeling.


	11. Tonight, Tonight

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "You're crazy." 
> 
> “That would imply that I am insane.” _Are you? Thinking that I am insane?_
> 
> “Maybe you are.”
> 
> _Oh._
> 
> “It was just a joke.” Felix says. Sensing the indignation in Felix's face, Locus knows. Felix does think he is insane. _But he can't say it. Like all the others in the world –_
> 
>  _Many a true word is spoken in jest. You claim to be joking, but you were simply telling the truth, and now you want to go back on your word and hide what you think. Why?_
> 
> -
> 
> Locus knows that he has issues, but he is shaken by Felix’s ill-thought-through comment nonetheless. When Felix proposes another study-date and fails to follow through, Locus realises that he has, unfortunately, fallen quite hard for the other young man.  
> (This part contains mild NSFW for non-explicit masturbation.)

**Tonight, Tonight**

 

“You would have to be crazy to think that.”

“That would imply that I am insane.” _Are you? Thinking that I am insane?_

“Maybe you are.”

_Oh._

“It was just a joke.” Felix says. Sensing the indignation in Felix's face, Locus knows. Felix _does_ think he is insane. _But he can't say it. Like all the others in the world –_

 _No,_ Locus corrects himself. _Stop thinking that way... He either hates me, or he doesn't hate me. There are only two possibilities. If he doesn't hate me, then I..._

_Then I – What?_

Locus looks at Felix, wondering what is going on inside his pretty head as he fumbles around with his words. He feels himself sliding back into a familiar frame of mind, and that frame of mind is, precisely, what Felix described: insane.

_Walk out. Just get up, and get out of here, and cut off all contact. He deserves no less –_

“Just joking, y'know.” The smaller man's hands wave in the air in a confusing flurry. Locus tries not to get distracted, but he knows that he can't unravel what Felix thinks from what he says, and that is the fundamental problem with communication. It is his problem; not Felix's. Locus is aware – far too aware – of just how different he is from the others. If he were just like the rest – normal – then perhaps he would be able to read Felix's expression, to see meaning in those hand gestures. Perhaps he would be able to understand, just from a glance, if Felix was sincere, or not. “Guess I fucked that one up... Hahaha... My bad.”

 _No. Him hating me has nothing to do with it. I... can't just hate him first. That is not right, especially if he is merely telling the truth._ Locus feels like the gathering clouds of wrath and hurt are dissipating. He bites the bottom of his lip now, his heavy heart lifting in forgiveness. He stops, knowing that it destroys the inside of his mouth, so he clenches his jaw shut, and takes in a deep breath.

 _Many a true word is spoken in jest. You claim to be joking, but you were simply telling the truth, and now you want to go back on your word and hide what you think. Why?_ Locus wonders, but he can't say that, not to Felix. It stings too much, because it is a line which bears the most precise acuity about the nature of his mind.

It suddenly occurs to him that perhaps he ought to say something. Locus lowers his voice, trying to keep it unemotional and casual. Hopefully, that will keep Felix from looking deep into his mind, finding vulnerabilities, and running in the opposite direction. “...I do not find it terribly funny.”

“Yeah, like I said, fucked that one up.” Felix's own voice hikes up, a bit higher and softer in pitch, like he is trying to sound as nonthreatening as possible – the same tone of voice often heard when a human coaxes a small animal to come closer.

When Locus offers to break the stalemate and move on to the next topic, and Felix smiles at him, as if he had just given him a welcome relief, Locus somehow knows that he has made the right decision.

What happens afterwards is not something that Locus is prepared for: Felix's smiles grow sweeter and sweeter, even as they are debating. It is as if Felix no longer cares about being right; as if he has given up a bit of his pride, and he starts to inch closer and closer – not just physically.

Locus elects to hold his mug tightly as he attempts to ignore Felix – the only way that he can keep himself from losing his composure. He has to look into Felix's face and eyes, because that's what people do. He finds it distracting enough when he has to do that with other people, but something about Felix's... beauty... or handsomeness... makes it ten times worse. That, and there are a whole host of other body language signals that he now has to try and figure out.

He doesn't mind it, exactly; Felix leaning close. What he minds is how much it _confuses_ him.

Either way, he chooses to push everything aside, to react as reasonably as he can. He knows that he will have time to ruminate about all of this later.

He stays for as long as he can, because he genuinely enjoys Felix's company. And, if Felix doesn't ask, he probably will not bring it up. But Felix _does_ ask, presumably because he is running through his mind just how much time he has until he really has to go every time he looks at the watch.

Relief washes over him, as Felix appears to understand.

Locus can't miss a class, or he will hate himself for it.

He is pleasantly surprised when Felix arranges for another study-date. Locus isn't sure what it means – all he knows is that it gives him hope. As he gives up thinking and analysing, he accepts the idea that he, too, is just a little bit happier than before the event.

Like tensed muscles demanding to rest after a strenuous workout, so too does his mind feel like it needs a very long vacation. His heart reminds him that he is still alive, and that he is happy, with its strong yet peaceful heartbeats.

*

Things always look so different in the dark.

Locus is awake. He finds himself being awake a lot more often these days; the worst thing about being awake are the thoughts that run through his head while idle. It is still only the middle of the week. He scratches his hip and looks up at the clock: It ticks two in the morning.

He rolls over to his side, feeling his hair bunch up below him as he tosses and turns again. The invisible gears in his head are running on at high speed, causing the rolling of his eyes behind his eyelids to be too quick and too uncontrolled – he is twitchy and his heart races.

_...Lonely._

_But I am not alone. I am meeting Felix soon, assuming that he's still interested in doing so._

He picks up the phone and looks at it, brows furrowing.

_No message, though. He said he would send me one. Send me something, please. I am waiting._

He looks away, wondering why his chest feels as if it is bursting open from the sheer loneliness. He tells himself that it is just a feeling, that it, too, shall pass. He covers his face slightly with his forearms, hands wrapped around his phone as if in a prayer.

_I don't understand. It went well, did it not? Perhaps it didn't, and I simply missed all of the cues. Perhaps I have failed to react to something nonverbal. Perhaps he took some time off, realised that I'm truly as crazy as he had a hunch about, and... He hates me. Loathes me now._

Eyes closed, he wonders if he should simply give up and let Felix ignore him in grace.

_I can't just send him a message. If that was his plan, I should simply let go._

Does he remember Felix? Can he recall his face? He is shocked when he thinks he can, but he can't. So he tries, again and again, to reconstruct Felix's face. _This seems about right. No, his nose isn't like that. No, he doesn't look like that actor at all! What am I doing? How am I so useless?_

The nature of memory is so vague, and the inhabitants of its landscape are so fluid. He trembles slightly under the sheets, even though it is cold, his massive body causing the bed to shudder below himself as he bolts up to get a drink.

As long as he doesn't see Felix right in front of him, or have the reassurance that they would see each other again, he cannot sleep. It eats at him; gnaws at him from within his guts like an empty worm from the void that threatens to consume all of existence with its absolute _nothingness_.

 _I don't understand. Just what is it to me? I thought I made peace. I did this in therapy. I can handle this. I can rationalise this away._ Think _._

_No, the first step is to..._

Locus switches on the light and sits himself down at the desk. He opens the notebook that he has used for therapy, and flips through the first front pages.

_I have to recognise my feelings. Embrace them. What are they?_

He closes his eyes again and lets his heart speak. He can feel his belly rumble; he makes a note to make himself some tea a bit later.

– _What are you sad about?_ He asks his trembling soul, his shivering heart.

– _I can't remember his face._ That small, fragile little... _Sam Ortez_... within answers, in a tiny voice, that he is lost and afraid, that he is lonely, and that he simply wants so badly to see Felix again that he doesn't even mind what he would have to do to get to do it.

Locus knows, from that moment on, that he – all aspects of himself, whether from the past or from the present – is beyond hope.

If there is something to understand about the heart, it is simply that it listens to no one; it wants what it does, with no regards for social conventions or the reciprocity from the object of desire.

Locus makes a cup of tea and sits down by the table, writing his thoughts down on the empty pages of his notebook. He finishes up his tea and cracks his knuckles.

_I will have to get a new one. Maybe I will get one for Felix too; he seems so intent on learning. A good notebook will make his studying experience better._

He smiles at himself, sadly. He looks at the clock again, looking at it; it ticks agonisingly slowly, but all too quickly. _That is the paradoxical nature of time when one wakes up outside of a schedule. It simply doesn't flow._ He notes, sadder than ever, and makes his decision to try and get back to sleep again. _I have to wake up early for class. Then I have to finish that essay and study for the … date... test._

Locus turns off the light, and slips back into bed. He bites his lower lip, wondering why he feels even worse with the lights off. He isn't afraid of the dark, and has practical views of it: Form is always form, the undeniable solidity of the visible.

He certainly isn't expecting to be besieged with memories of Felix from the date. He can't even remember his face! Yet he sees, clearly in his mind's eyes, those soft, pink lips, shapely and curved like an angel's. It brings a pang to his heart, and he bites his own lips, feeling the absence of another pair of lips on his.

 _Plato's idea of Justice._ The edges of his lips lift as he remembers the situation. _Felix was talking about Plato's idea of Justice, and why it was all simply theoretical hot-air, impracticable in reality._

The thought of Felix makes his breath hitch again.

 _Warmth and Felix,_ Locus thinks, _goes hand-in-hand._ He smiles quietly from a reassuring bliss when he remembers again, how Felix looks up at him with those dark eyes of his, pausing the rapid movement of his gaze to gaze at him, and only him – it makes Locus almost lose his breath. _Don't be stupid. Felix simply is what he is; he does not exist for you._

Now that he has time for it to sink in, Felix is _beautiful_ in a way that it makes him ache. Even the smell of tobacco, thick and often fresh, doesn't bother Locus on Felix. It is as if he could accept everything about the other man, cynical views and all, so long as he can understand where he comes from.

He relaxes completely into the sheets, feeling his mattress sink in comfortably underneath him to accommodate his shape. It feels warm here; so warm, as if Felix could also be right there, beside him – Locus feels ghost hands holding him and ghost lips pressing against his own. He embraces them, thinking them a part of his memory of Felix, even though he knows that none of it happened, that it is only a projection of his mind.

 _Felix._ He is so lonely that he would take fragments of a memory and embrace it as real, if only it would lessen the anguish.

He closes his eyes, reaches down, and thinks of Felix. Not his face anymore – something else. Locus feels that what he is doing is wrong, and yet he's calling out from deep within his soul for something to help, for someone to help. There is only one person who can help him – one person who can lesson the ache in his soul.

 _Save me, Felix. I'm lonely. It's unbearable. Help me. Hold me._ He reaches for a pillow and holds it tightly, breathing it in. Soft and warm. _I wonder, is Felix –?_

He thinks of Felix, and his small frame feels almost real right there. Felix, as a warm presence. Felix, with a fire in his soul, and a sparkle in his eyes. Felix, held, holding him back.

Locus knows that he is weak, and that he is doing this in a moment of weakness. The realness of his fantasy, of ghostly Felix, con-substantial with the sins of his own desires, sacred yet profane. He reaches down, ignoring the body that he disavows as his for now, and concentrates on embracing Felix – embracing his _spirit_ , if only he could.

He isn't sure what to imagine; all he can think of is the physicality of Felix's closeness, even as the other man is not there. _Being_ , Locus feels, is so incredibly and unbearably _light_ in that moment, lifted in the meaning of the act, with no gravity pulling him down.

Locus wishes that he isn't doing this, that he isn't so weak as to think of Felix in this way.

_I... am crazy._

Suddenly feeling a bit too hot, he rejects the embrace of his sheets and pulls down his pants almost desperately, feeling the emptiness of the cold air above. The moonlight outside illuminates the reality of his body, and of the pillow, making him feel light-headed. He closes his eyes and lets himself slip fully into the illusion of Felix being there.

_Felix..._

_Heal me. Please... I'm sad. Touch me._

He inhales deeply and rocks his hips into the hotness of his own slack grip, imagining that he is holding the soft warmness of Felix in the other arm.

So far away and so different, and yet, in a terrible way, incredibly close.

The mental image of the other man, impossibly, heartrendingly small in his arms, looking up at him with the same smile and the same eyes as he had the fortune of beholding in the cafe – it makes him shudder one last time.

He remembers Felix's face, now, in all of its entirety. At least, he thinks he does; he isn't sure if it is Felix, or just a mentally idealised version of him.

Locus is fully aware of how wretched he himself is, as a person.

He lies there, letting his bodily fluid dry up on the thin fabric of his shirt, thinking that he will change it tomorrow. He wants to remember, to think of it as an evidence of something – his feelings for Felix, perhaps. A feeling that he shall have to deal with in the morning.

He rests, pulling the sheets back over himself again when it gets too cold.

*

A clear-minded Locus holds an extra notebook in his hand. He dislikes making last-minute plans, but he wants to try.

With trembling hands, he taps a message to the other man, biting the inside of his cheek as he does so.

“I understand if you have changed your mind,” He begins. “If you would still like to meet up to review the syllabus for the test tomorrow, I would be quite happy to do so. If not –” So many ifs – “I understand as well.”

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> (Not serious) Alternate chapter summary: Locus demonstrates the healing powers of masturbation.


	12. How It's Going to Be

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Felix gets a surprise at work.

_Shit._

Felix stares at his phone, half dressed, his shirt in his hand, aghast. It's only been a day, it's ten in the morning, but Locus just texted him as if he's left him hanging for a week.

_Clingy much—_

That thought turns his stomach. That word, again. It rings bitter in his head, despite being directed at someone else. In a way it makes the whole thing worse. He throws his phone aside, with no remorse. He has work to get to.

Felix arrives at the gas station, a little place, not even a chain, and finds that the universe has once again managed to screw him over: Malcolm, the owner, is here, and the man is an anal-retentive fuck of the worst kind. He has this idea in his head that there's something worthwhile about owning a fucking stop and rob, dolling out cigarettes and lotto tickets and junk food while people stare in bored stupors at gas pumps outside. Usually, Felix’s job pretty much amounts to cleaning up slushie spills and playing on his phone for nine hours, but when Malcolm is in, it's price checking and restocking and then _triple_ checking and mopping a floor that’s fine, really, and whatever other overkill shit he can think of, all of which happens while he berates Felix for failing to meet expectations; taunting him with all the reasons he was hired and all the expectations Malcom and the usual manager, Price, originally had for him. As if having a resume that could get him hired at a gas station was any great feat in the first place. As if he gives a damn what they thing about him. He's here because it pays, and because it sucks in a predictable, monotonous way that doesn't stress him out. That simple.

Not that he can say that out loud.

Malcolm haunts the first _four hours_ of his shift, nagging and blustering and lecturing in that pretentious fucking accent, and by the time he's gone, Felix has all but made up his mind to intentionally accomplish _nothing_ the rest of the day to balance out his overworked early shift. As soon as he's sure Malcolm is gone, he leans across the counter and lets his forehead smack against the price scanner.

 _Priceless,_ he imagines it ringing. _Fucking deal, if you can get it._ If he feels like giving it.

Cautiously, in his head, he adds _non-refundable: No returns accepted_ to his price tag, too. He likes the sound of that: If required, someone out there would probably keep him. Really keep him.

Really want him.

His phone, suddenly, feels heavy in his pocket.

Felix scrapes his head off the counter and pulls it out, leaning over still with his arms stretched out between racks of candy and the register. Locus’ message stares back at him. He's made the guy wait about 5 hours now, maybe 6—probably enough to send a message about too much  . . . Well, sending messages.

And besides. If he's being honest, he doesn’t really care anymore, anyway. He's cooled off by now and maybe, on second thought, there's even something nice about the extra attention, even if it is a bit heavy handed. Besides, he likes the picture he's painting in his head of Locus’ stoic face shifting, maybe lighting up, just a little, because Felix has something to say.  So he hammers out a text.

 _Keep it casual,_ he reminds himself as he types.

_< I'm still down to study, no problem. Would Friday morning work? Ended up picking up some hours Wednesday>_

He hasn’t actually _committed_ to the new schedule, yet, but it’s better to be safe than sorry given that Malcolm seems to have it out for him this week.

It takes Locus a full ten minutes to respond. Felix drums his fingers on the counter as he waits, staring down a rack of Doritos, chewing on his lip—Maybe that was too casual. Maybe he waited _too_ long to respond, moving from a message of _calm down_ to _I’m_ _not worth it._ He frets until the text comes through _._

Locus’ answer is succinct:

< _Friday will work. But we will have to meet early, before the test. >_

Felix winces. “Morning person” is not his nature. But he types _< sounds good. 9:00?> _all the same _._

Locus confirms the time, and says no more.

Felix watches his phone. Watches the station: Nothing. No customers. No messes, even, for once.

He picks the phone back up.

_< So what are you up to?>_

There's a long, irritatingly long, delay between hitting send and a new message arriving.

_< I'm on my way to the gym. You said you were working today?>_

_< Yeah. At my crap job. I'm so bored I could die.> _He almost writes _so bored I could kill myself,_ but somehow it doesn’t seem right.

< _But you can text at work? >_

This reply is slightly faster.

_< Depending on who else is in. When it's just me no one cares.>_

_< I imagine so.>_

_That_ reply is nearly instantaneous. Felix is still gawking at his phone, trying to digest the concept that Locus—big, stoic, eloquent Locus—is actually _capable_ of sarcasm or facetiousness when the next text comes through.

< _You're welcome to text me if you're still bored, but I will have to stop responding for a while. Phones are frowned upon in the weight room. >_

_Of course he fucking lifts._

Felix cracks a smile at the thought that, not only could Locus probably bench him, he could do it with great form.

_< Sure thing. Have fun pumping iron or whatever the fuck the kids call it these days.>_

Felix never receives a reply to that, so he's stacking candy bars jenga-style to entertain himself instead by the next time he hears from Locus.

The door dings and Felix looks up from his jenga candy to see someone tall and dark-skinned moving rapidly away from the counter, having turned in his heel, avoiding eye contact, to head straight for the aisle he needs rather than bothering to actually acknowledge the cashier. Felix scowls as best he can: the guy is ripped, _ripped_ beneath his shirt, sweats clinging a little low on his hips, enough that a little of that lovely dark brown skin might just reveal itself were he to lift his arms, and to be fair,  it's hard to resent anyone who looks like that.

Impossible, in fact.

Felix knows this, because he's already proven as much to himself courtesy of this exact person.

With his hair pulled back, Felix almost hadn’t recognized him. 

And now that he _has_ realized who he's looking at, he can't even get himself together enough to shove the jenga candy out of sight, because he's too busy memorizing  every line and angle in Locus’ face. He is everything under his hair Felix couldn't quite imagine: Hard angles, square jawed, his cheekbones more prominent than Felix had realized.  He's . . . _Beautiful,_ really. Not even handsome.  Not even sexy. He's actually, legitimately gorgeous in a very hard, strong way. In a statuesque features and build, neck-like-Felix’s-thigh and thighs-like-Felix -can't -even- _imagine_ kind of way.

He couldn't stop himself from saying something if he tried.

“Locus?”

The other man, so previously intent on looking _not_ at the cashier, snaps his head up and takes Felix in with startled eyes.

For a beat there is silence, just staring at each other. Felix clears his throat.

“I've never seen you in here before,” he offers in a tangled, inscient rush of words. _Jesus, stupid. Calm down._

“I don't usually shop here.”

“Right, I figured.”

Another beat of silence. Locus is watching him with his hand half around a protein bar he'd been about to pick up when Felix startled him. Felix is suddenly, painfully aware of his ridiculous candy jenga game.

“I was jogging,” Locus offers. “Over a new route. It runs by here.”

“Gotcha. Well… welcome to my work. Then. I guess. Told you it was crappy.”

Locus inspects the room. Felix inspect his face. Watches the way his eyes rove over the fixtures, the way his Adam's apple moves as he swallows, the way his hair glistens under a sheen of sweat. It's not quite black, nothing like Felix's, but it _is_ richly dark and, even damp, he imagines it being soft.

“I worked at a place like this once. It's at least quiet,” Locus declares, tearing Felix away from his ogling.

“There is that,” Felix agrees, “during the day. You should see it at night.”

He grimaces.

“I imagine being this close to a liquor store gets tiring.”

“Oh god, like you have no idea. Drunk idiots everywhere. They get wasted and then come and buy cigarettes, or chasers, or whatever. And those are the ones that don’t also have the munchies.”

Locus frowns.

“Delightful,” he says, making his way over to the drink case and withdrawing the largest water bottle they sell. Felix shoves the candy jenga aside while his back is turned, so it's at least mostly out of sight by the time Locus approaches the counter. Felix watches him with a kind of hyper-real focus, taking in details so short a walk across the store shouldn’t be space enough to reveal: the way his shirt shifts, a little stuck to a small patch of sweat on his chest, tight across his body. The evenness of his breathing, as if he hasn’t broken a sweat in hours. The contours of his body that Felix hasn’t seen before—Felix's blood pressure goes up until he imagines he can feel his heart jerking at the tissues tethering it in place in his chest, because if Locus’ chest is good, his arms might even be better. Felix absorbs the idea of letting his fingers explore the topography of so much muscle as he brings that sculpted chest closer to his own, intoxicated by the concept. It's a miracle he can still form words, in the wake of such an ambitious wandering thought.

“Yep,” Felix stammers. Locus sets his purchases down on the counter slowly, glancing up at Felix as he does. _Up._ The guy is like 6’4” and he still manages to keep up a posture that means his gaze has to rise to meet Felix's.  And it’s a nice look that he gives him—guarded but steady, bright and intelligent and something else… emotive, thoughtful… vulnerable. There's no hint of _that_ anywhere else in his face, in that hard and noble bone structure, but it's there in his eyes. Felix finds it mesmerizing.

“Don’t worry about it,” he blurts, as Locus reaches into his pocket to pay, “Price—the manager—doesn’t give a shit if employees grab a snack here and there. I'll call it one of mine.”

“Are you sure?”

“Yeah, totally! “

“You won't get in trouble for using your… _discount_ for someone else?”

Felix shrugs.

“Price might yell at me a little if he ever actually bothers to check the feed,” he jerks his head at the security camera overhead, “but honestly, he's going to find a reason to do that anyway. It's fine.”

Locus looks unconvinced, but he withdraws his hand from his pocket all the same.

“Thank you.”

“Any time.”

Locus’ brows knit.

“How often do you work around school?”

“Part time.  My dad is good for tuition, so. This is just for…whatever.”

Cigarettes and coffee mainly, these days. But he's not sure if he should say that out loud or not.

“The hours change up though,” he adds, afraid of how unavailable 20-30 hours plus school might sound. “I'm not always stuck here on weekends.”

Locus’ brows don’t unknit. Felix's throat itches, a promise of anxiety and its strangling hand.

“Usually I do afternoons,” he continues, just a _touch_ too fast, “sometimes mornings before class, when Price decides to suck.”

“Those aren’t bad hours,” Locus offers.

“They don’t totally suck,” he agrees. “It can get a little busy as people get out of class, but it's livable.”

Locus nods, his face relaxing. Felix could kill to know what that means.

Forgoing murder, he settles with leaning across the counter, propped on his forearms, instead. It's the second time in as many days that he's managed to position himself this way, looking up at Locus from what he knows is his very best angle, all eyes. His hands are near enough to the edge of the counter that he half expects, with a pang in his gut, for Locus to step back. He doesn’t. He seems to stiffen, the motion betrayed by the tiniest change in the way his shirt lays across his body, a few of the wrinkles pulling out. But stiffen is not _back off_ and it is not necessarily _discomfort_ of the undesirable kind, either, so Felix doesn’t bother withdrawing.

“So,” he ventures, “how was the gym?”

“Crowded,” Locus replies. To call it a _huff_ would be a stretch, but not by much. Felix battles the corner of his mouth, trying to nail it down before it can creep up into a smile at the wrong time, but it tears loose anyway. _You can lift me instead, if you want._

“Ouch,” he says, a much tamer response than he’s dreaming about.  “Hence the jog?”

“Hence the longer route.”

“Ah.”

Quiet settles between them.

Felix is good at filling silences, usually, but he finds he doesn’t have anywhere he can take the conversation now except to radically change the subject, and technically, it’s Locus’ turn to choose a new subject. Which he doesn’t.

Oddly enough, that doesn’t bother him. It’s a broach of some kind of social protocol, he’s sure, but Locus doesn’t behave like most people anyway—not just in the sense of the weird name or dark clothing or defensive posture—and while everyone else Felix has ever met has had their price for conversation, a certain willingness to take over if only asked about themselves, Locus is perfectly frank, yet the polar opposite of forthcoming.  Felix isn’t sure where or how to nudge him to open him up. And while that might be repulsive in any other situation, right now, with this man, it's just terrifyingly fascinating. Locus doesn’t come with “normal” peoples’ rules any more than Felix does.  That makes him a whole new world to play in, and the freedom of that, he suspects, might just be the nicotine in his rapidly growing addiction.

So content is he with this strange new quiet that, in the end, he's pretty happy just to lean on the counter and stare at the guy. Though Locus, after a while, seems to grow uncomfortable; begins to look too stoic, even for him, as if he's sucking back into himself in preparation to leave. Felix—saving his sigh for the confines of his own mind—adds:

“So... you’re jogging because of the crowd, but normally you lift, you said?”

Locus nods.

“Do you?”

“Uhhh… no. _Working out_ isn’t really my thing... I mean, I own a pull up bar and throw in some pushups in the morning sometimes and all that crap, but that's about it.”

“I'd consider that ‘working out.’”

“It’s something-out... _Work_ is a strong word.”

Locus makes a low sound, accompanied by a quick exhalation through his nose, which Felix takes as a laugh.

_Score._

_Score, score, score._

He's smiling too broadly. Felix knows he is. It wasn’t _that_ funny. It wasn’t even all that witty. But there he is, grinning like an idiot all the same, because Locus thought something of it. Because Locus, _Locus,_ laughed.

Felix would pay everything he has just to hear that again—

Not that the world is interested enough in his money to take that bribe. It prefers his misery.

A couple of loudmouthed college kids, freshmen by the looks of them (though it's hard to say if they actually look young or just act that way) come in soon after that, prompting a polite but rapid exit for Locus and ten minutes of reluctant soda and chip ringing for Felix. He's decently pissed by their entire existence as he rings, scowling at their stack of sodas and snack cakes, but he consoles himself by thinking, over and over, that even if that’s his hit of Locus for the day, and even if he has next to no time to talk to him in class over the next week, and even if he can't think of anything to text him, he's still guaranteed a slot of his time at 9:00 am on Friday morning that nothing in the universe is going to claw from his eager little hands.


	13. You Lied

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> He suspects, vaguely, that people can sense the loneliness and desperation, and, fearing him, run from him as they view him Caliban.
> 
>  _Frankenstein's Monster,_ Locus thinks, his eyes fixed on a small letter "a" at the start of a new chapter. _Born for goodness, but cursed with something unnatural. Everyone hates him. That is how he loses his humanity. When even his creator rejects him, his proverbial father, he... loses all hope. Abandons all hope. For hell is other people._

Morning. The bed creaks as Locus flips onto his side. He ignores the light that bugs him though his eyelids for a split second before opening them wide. There is a reason he did not have blinds – he wants to always know the time.

He breathes in deeply and reaches for his phone to check for the time; it is twenty minutes before his alarm.

Locus throws the sheets off and gets up anyway.

He shivers as the cold air surrounds him; a change from the toasty blankets. He wishes that it were the weekend already; he hasn't been sleeping well during the weekdays. The only time he is able to get any decent sleep is during the weekends, and even those long days seem to be passing too quickly when he spends them all actually doing things. Essays, for example. Research. He still has more research to do before he would be comfortable with deciding on a topic.

But first, he had other things to focus on. Such as the test. And the date before that.

– _To call it a date would be far too premature._ Locus corrects himself. _It is less of a date, and more of an appointment. A study appointment._

Felix, ostensibly, does not need any help. Locus considers Felix's ideas to be lacking in logical consistency, but they, too, have some sort of external dimensions that he personally has not considered. Locus does not know anything about how the test will be graded, but he assumes that it will be nigh impossible to fail it. The only reason anybody fails anything in Doyle’s class is because they didn't hand anything in.

Locus reaches for the loose tea and puts some into the filter. He watches as the water boils, finding the sound of bubbling water comforting. He feels his brows unknit and his muscles relax as he pours the hot water into the dainty teapot; something unfitting for somebody his size, perhaps, but nonetheless incredibly soothing to hold, with its smooth ceramic handle and its delicate little spout crafted for precision.

The water flows into the teacup in a perfect arc.

Locus removes his other hand from the lid of the teapot, puts in two cubes of sugar, and stirs. It is a nice ritual for the morning, when he has extra time for it. He glances at his phone again. _Ten minutes, gone now. I will finish this up in another ten._

He takes a couple of biscuits out of the packaging, puts them on the plate, and begins to eat. On days like this, it will be impossible to sneak in a proper meal besides at the cafeteria, and he hates going there; it is always so crowded.

He manages to finish his breakfast with one minute to spare. _Time to make my own lunch, to bring with me. Sandwiches, as usual._

_Should I make extra for him?_

_...No._

Locus wants to slap himself for even thinking about it. Felix is a fully grown man who can clearly take care of himself, but something about him makes Locus ache. Perhaps it is the way that the man seems so small, physically speaking, or the way those eyes look up at him like they want to be acknowledged.

Locus knows what it is like – to want to be acknowledged. He wonders why Felix gives him that vibe, or if he is even reading Felix correctly, at all. He adds slices of lettuce between the bread, making sure that they're dry, and wraps them up neatly.

_Either way, it has nothing to do with sandwiches. Does he eat enough? Maybe he simply has a high metabolism. I knew this guy in high school who could finish an Ultimate Double Whopper and still look emaciated._

_Maybe I should make an extra sandwich. Everyone likes food._

_**No** _ _. That'd be creepy._

Locus decides that he doesn't want to be a creep; there's too many things whispered about him behind his back. Too many people looking nervous if he even walks on the same street as they do. It's not something he can win. Ever.

*

Locus did not have time to put on his contacts that day, having stood in the kitchen for far too long agonising over whether or not he wanted to make a sandwich. He thinks, inhaling deeply and painfully, that perhaps that should be the first sign that things were simply not going to go well that day.

_Unfortunate._

His glasses sit on his nose uncomfortably.

He tries to read the textbook, but his eyes keep wandering to his phone. No answer from Felix. He looks at his mug; it is empty. Quietly, he gets up, and orders another cup of coffee. His uneasiness from Felix's absence must be radiating from him, he realises, as the barista looks at him uncomfortably and her movements stiffen. He tries to smile; it doesn't work.

He returns to the table, and tries to look at the textbook again, both hands uneasily clenching his mug.

 _Felix isn't here, and it has already been an hour. I should make use of the time to study. Perhaps I should leave and go to class earlier – but where would I sit? No, I should stay._ Besides, perhaps Felix would come, even at the last minute. If that were the case, Locus would hate himself for not staying.

Despite knowing that he should be focusing on the test at hand, his eyes keep wandering to his phone. This test will constitute a whopping thirty percent of his grade, and he desperately wants to do well enough to get into a decent post-graduate program.

The self-hatred, of course, refuses to go away. Small thoughts of obsession eat away at his soul. He flattens his upper lip, looking up at the barista, who practically jumps at the sudden eye contact.

_Right. People hate me. I wonder what I must have looked like to her. See myself as others see me... Pfah. Better not_ _._

He starts to remember every single thing that he has done, everything that he has tried to do. It comes back like an unbreakable singular string of failures that basically constitutes his entire being.

 _It's almost over._ Locus thinks. _I should get up and go to class. He won't be coming._

He wants to think clearly, but can't. _Too weak._ He judges himself for it, making himself feel worse in the process. _I should know better. Why do I not know better._

Two texts, within a span of ten minutes, then nothing. Too needy, perhaps. He knows how it seems, and suspects, vaguely, that people can sense the loneliness and desperation, and, fearing him, run from him as they view him Caliban.

 _Frankenstein's Monster,_ Locus thinks, his eyes fixed on a small letter "a" at the start of a new chapter. _Born for goodness, but cursed with something unnatural. Everyone hates him. That is how he loses his humanity. When even his creator rejects him, his proverbial father, he... loses all hope. Abandons all hope. For hell is other people._

_I should stop aspiring now._

The glasses keep his hair out of the way, at least; they hang to the side, making him feel uncomfortable with the idea that anybody could simply see his face, especially since he must be looking wretched and sullen right then. He gets up, looks at the notebook – the one that he was supposed to give Felix – and takes it with him.

 _I'll think of him every time I see it now. Might as well use it. If I think of him, maybe..._ He grits his teeth. _Maybe I won't forget that I should never reach out for anybody ever again._

He pictures himself heading to the library, to be among books, but he knows that he'll just be miserable there, too, as miserable as he is anywhere else. There is no quiet spot in this place, besides his home, where he is safe to lose his mind. And has.

_I should work out. Endorphins. Could be a slight distraction._

_I don't want to._

Locus gets up, heading to class. The rush of students going to and fro from place to place form a certain sort of rhythm – the sort that simply makes him feel out of touch and out of place. He wishes that everyone would be quieter, that life would be softer, and the day less grey.

 _How much more will I hate myself if I let myself waste away again?_ He wonders, looking at his arm. Scars that only look like old sources of endorphins. He feels the urge come back again.

He self-consciously pulls the sleeves down his wrist. It feels too large; too meaty. A part of him wants to waste away, to vanish.

 _No. No point in that._ I _have survived worse._

The title “survivor” seems like something that he has, more or less, rightfully earned. It makes him feel stronger. The scars... The bulking up. They are all signs of something – like a stone becoming calcified, hardened.

_This too, I shall survive._

He does not look up as he simply heads into the lecture hall, to his usual seat. If Felix wants to be left alone, he will be left alone.

 _If he comes, what then?_ He asks himself, almost panicking.

_Ignore him. Steel yourself, and shut out all emotions. You've done this before. It's easy. What's him to you, anyway? Nobody, that's what. You jerked off to him once. So what._

Locus takes in a deep breath, looking at the front. The desk is too small for him; the chair too shaky. He has plans to return home as soon as class ends, so that he may bury himself in bed.

_No, I..._

_It isn't like this. I didn't do it just because..._

_That makes it more pathetic. So what will you do now? Hate him? Isn't it easy to just hate someone for rejecting you? Might as well do it. What's he to you? Just another..._

_No. I can't. My feelings are my own business, not his. I will deal with them responsibly._ He knows that hatred will just eat him alive. The least he could do is… nothing.

He clenches his fist again, and looks up as the TA hands him the test papers. He follows instructions easily, without thinking.

When it finally is time, he flips over the paper, and looks through the questions. Relief floods him, as he realises that he actually knows what the questions are asking about, even though his concentration has been shot all day. He quickly jots down the key points, and sits up straight and proud in satisfaction.

 _Locus_ knows some things. He has value. He has worth, no matter how otherwise useless, disgusting, and hated he is.

*

Locus has enough time to proofread half of the paper when the TA announces that time is up. He breathes in in relief and hands it in, face blank, with the assurance of a machine. Sometime during the test, he has managed to tie his hair up, and now he takes out the noise-cancelling earplugs. With them on, the world exists in a nice, constant state of stasis, but he feels better being slightly more aware of his environment.

He stands up, and notices that Felix is still scribbling something onto his paper. He has arrived and sat down at the end of the row at some point during the test, late, even to this.

Usually, Locus would be judging.

He blinks, and looks away.

His footsteps bring him back to the door right outside lecture hall, even though he tries to look down on the floor and walk away.

 _He looks wild-eyed,_ Locus thinks. He isn't sure what to make of it. Feelings are strange, wordless creatures; they creep up on him and stop him in his tracks, and the next thing he knows, he's no longer a machine, but a pathetic, tortured soul. All he knows is that he won't be able to live with himself if he had just let it go like this.

He takes out the notebook, and looks at it.

_It's his, anyway._

_When this is done, it is over. I will let it go._

 


	14. Nervous

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Later, he walks into his apartment, shuts the door, drops his bag, and sinks into a near-squat, so enthusiastic is the pump of his fist as he declares at top volume to himself and his empty, shit studio, that's he's still got it. 
> 
> _I. am. awesome._ He tells himself, feeling inflated, elated, manic, maybe. 
> 
> He lets himself say out loud, for once: 
> 
> “Score one, Felix.”

_Motherfucker._

Locus finishes the test before Felix, despite his best efforts, and Locus’ thoughtful, methodical consideration of the questions; the scratch of his pencil like clockwork scraping across Felix’s brain. Felix races through his own packet. After all, no good ever comes of changing an answer. Second guessing is crap, on tests. There's enough in his life he can't be sure of without adding this to the pile.

Locus, for example.

He doesn’t seem mad. But he's always so terse, so damnably quiet. So apparently unbothered by Félix's lateness. Felix doesn’t trust it. He doesn’t trust that Locus gets up to hand in his test with only a single sideways glance in his direction, and his heart shrinks a little in his chest as he watches him move for the lecture hall door. _Fine. Go._

His thoughts sound like bullshit even to him, collapsing from false resentment into a single, desperate plea: _Don’t go._

_And don’t be mad. Please don’t be mad._

It would make sense if he was. Felix knows that. Under it all, he knows that. So he's not expecting anything but an uphill battle before him if he wants to keep Locus’ company. Which he does. He can't help it, how much he does.

In any case, he is definitely not expecting to find Locus waiting for him outside the lecture hall after he finishes his test. Pinching himself seems like a good idea, for the first few seconds before the Déjà vu sets in: The feeling of guarded eagerness blended with surprise, the place, it’s like that day with the note. Right down to the nagging possibility, closing up his throat, that this encounter will end in Locus being angry. Or noticing that Felix is still in his pajama sweats.

“Oh,” Felix forces himself to say, breathing deeply between words, “Hey. What's up? I mean—look, I am so so sorry about this morning. I was up until five this morning finishing a paper, and I guess my alarm didn’t go off,” or he slept through it, “or something, and I forgot to plug in my phone, I almost didn’t even make it to the test and I couldn’t text you and—”

“I understand,” Locus says.

In any other situation, it would irritate Felix to be cut off, but all these words bring him is a hesitant relief. There is nothing in his tone to suggest either sincerity or a lack of it, but there is a softness to his furrowed brow and the way he looks at him, searching Felix’s eyes as he doesn’t often do. His glasses—so good on him that Felix thinks they may be giving him palpitations—slip down his nose by a few millimeters as he looks down to examine Felix’s face.

Felix bites his lip, but then the words are out, anyway:

“ _Oh thank god_.”

_You did not just say that._

“Er, I felt like such an asshole. Did you . . . at least get any studying done without me? How was the test, for you?”

Felix is talking far, far too fast, the words a horrid rush. _Shut up, shut up, shut up._

_If you’re going to say something, make it good. You know that._

He even knows how to _do_ that, usually, but right now he must just sound like a mess. Locus frowns. _You’re such a fucking—_

“I found the test was easy, but I both had plenty of sleep and did have time to prepare beforehand. Did you feel good about it?”

Felix hesitates. _Good. Hah, yeah right._ He hasn’t felt good since the second he sat down to start his paper last night, and he sure as hell doesn’t feel good now as the horrified adrenaline that has been fueling him all morning instead of coffee starts to fade. He feels like fainting.

“It wasn’t too bad,” he says anyway, forcing the words to be casual, forcing a little bit of a smile. “’Pretty sure the only way to fail something of Doyle’s is just not to turn it in, anyway.”

Locus’ brows tick upward for a moment, and before they lower again, a hint of a smile only he understands pulls at the very far corner of his mouth.

“That’s probably true.”

For a moment after that, there is crushing silence. Crushing for Felix, anyway. His throat squeezes itself shut, and he swallows hard to clear it, and when he next speaks it’s just to prove to himself that he can still get air in and out.

“Our studying definitely helped, though,” he says. “Didn’t we already talk about that last essay question for like, an hour?”

“ . . . I believe we did, yes.”

 _That’s better. Now keep going, genius. Keep him talking._ Keep him here.

Felix clears his throat again. “After this kind of shit, I wouldn’t blame you for not wanting to meet up, but if we’re cool, I’d be down to keep doing that. I guess the midterm is the beginning of next month or something.”

“The fifth.”

_That’s not an answer._

Felix flexes his fingers at his side, clenching his fist for a moment, so hard his nails dig into his palm deeply enough that it hurts. Locus’ face remains impassive except for a slight pursing of his mouth before a furrow appears between lifting brows and he says:

“With so much time remaining, we could schedule more consistent meetings rather than cramming them in before class.”

Felix’s hand goes slack.

“That’d be great. It’s a little harder to sleep through something like that.” He lets himself laugh, and though Locus doesn’t join him, his expression doesn’t suggest he’s at all offended by the joke. _That’s right big guy, just roll with it._ That’s what the people who do manage to get along with him always do: they roll with it, and they tolerate him. At least for a while.

The only problem in this case is that what Felix would really want, what he he’d really, really want if he could have anything, would be for Locus to not only tolerate him, but _like_ him. And after this morning, that’s more than he’d dare expect.

Then again, Locus doesn’t do most things that he’d expect.

The notebook he withdraws from under one arm is definitely, definitely something he wouldn’t have seen coming, for one thing, seeing as he reaches out and _offers it to Felix._

It's plain, college ruled, probably, based on the size. It's bound instead of spiral, which is nice.

“I purchased an extra notebook,” Locus says as he offers it, voice very even, if somehow lighter than usual, despite how low it still is, “if you’d like it. I noticed yours is quite full.”

_Make words, Felix._

“You noticed that?” he blurts. _Not those, idiot._

Locus frowns very slightly. The notebook is still between them.

“I mean—sorry—Sure, I could totally use one, if you're sure you don’t want it. “

“I bought it as a . . . spare. But I realized I don’t need it. I'd like if you had it instead.”

Felix’s throat closes up again, this time because his heart has jumped up, lodged there, and is now pounding furiously against his vocal chords. Which is probably why all he can do for a second is swallow and take the notebook.

“Thanks, Locus.”

It's a pointed use of his name, his hammering heart beating out its syllables as a way if conveying something messy and overeager that Felix cannot and dare not actually say. Something like _this just became my favorite notebook because you gave it to me_. Something like _holy shit, I will take actual notes in this._

_Because I want you to see me using it._

Because he wants him to see him enjoying things Locus does. Anything Locus does—and especially things Locus does for him.

_I am so fucked._

Locus nods.

“You're welcome . . . Felix.”

His name sounds good on Locus’ tongue. And about the only thing better than the way it sounds is the way it _looks_ , something like a smile creeping into his surprisingly bright eyes.

Really Felix should have been an actor: After all, he does such a damned good job of resisting a swoon. What feels like a swoon. Not that he’d actually do that, ever. Even for Locus. _Especially_ not in front of Locus. He’s got way better self-control than that—he’s too confident. Too together.

Really, this shouldn’t be surprising. He gets what he wants. Why should this be different—just because he wants it so, so badly? Just because the world never lets him keep anyone he wants for long? That’s what he tells himself to muffle the screaming anxiety of _this could actually work out, if I don’t fuck it up, if the world stops hating me, if, if, if . . ._

The technique works. Later, he walks into his apartment, shuts the door, drops his bag, and sinks into a near-squat, so enthusiastic is the pump of his fist as he declares at top volume to himself and his empty, shit studio, that's he's still got it.

 _I. am. awesome_. He tells himself, feeling inflated, elated, manic, maybe, all of the sudden, because with that notebook in his bag, he can almost believe it. He lets himself say out loud, for once:

“Score one, Felix.”

 


End file.
